Schumann and BusoniJacob Greenberg, piano

About

Pianist Jacob Greenberg releases his second album on New Focus Recordings, featuring two towering works by Robert Schumann and Ferruccio Busoni.

Audio

# Audio Title/Composer(s) Time
Total Time 56:01

Humoreske, op. 20

Robert Schumann (1810-1856)
01I. Einfach
I. Einfach
5:44
02II. Hastig
II. Hastig
4:39
03III. Einfach und zart
III. Einfach und zart
4:33
04IV. Innig-Sehr lebhaft
IV. Innig-Sehr lebhaft
6:45
05V. Zum Beschluss
V. Zum Beschluss
6:39
06Fantasia Contrappuntistica
Fantasia Contrappuntistica
27:41

EPICS IN TWO CASTS

The two masterpieces on this disc are musical fantasies of equal ingenuity but contrasting effect. Schumann's Humoreske, like many of his other early piano works, can be as private as a diary entry; Busoni's virtuoso Contrapuntal Fantasy, however, is meant for a grand stage. But both pieces are not so simply characterized as public or private, as each reflects the personalities of the composers in reaction to the spirit of their age.

Robert Schumann made a futile mission to too-conservative Vienna in 1838, trying to secure a wider audience for his compositions. He wrote straightforward pieces for those concertgoers - his Arabeske and Blumenstück - but simultaneously worked on the long Humoreske, for which he could not have imagined a likely performance. The piece therefore became everything Schumann could not create in his more "public" opuses - it is alternately flighty and pensive, and a thousand moods in between.

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The Humoreske can be described as a solitary walk through the woods, during which Schumann gets closer to the core of his true self and returns refreshed. That the music remains so sure-footed among its unpredictable adventures shows the mastery of its construction, which derives from one basic rhythm, a march figure that permeates the piece's main themes throughout its five episodes, routing it among many digressions, but is rarely explicit.

In the Humoreske, Schumann dons many guises - poet, warrior-hero, and languid Romantic - staying wide-eyed on his journey through identities. The private dimension of the piece is most striking at the beginning of the second section ("Hastig," or hasty), where Schumann writes out, in a staff of its own, an inner musical line not to be played but articulated only in reflection through the surrounding music. Labeled "Innere Stimme" (inner voice), the profoundly intimate melody begs the questions: who is this music even for, if its essence can only be thought by the performer alone? The wildly introverted passage is however at the same time ambitiously public, as it is an attempt to define the spirit of the Romantic era - an epic gesture, although one that is rooted in the secret expressions of an unheard language.

In his public life, Ferruccio Busoni assumed multiple roles: showman, classicist, and mystic. Known as the greatest pianist of his age and perhaps of all time, it was rather his role as a composer that obsessed him. Devoted to music's history - and specifically to J.S. Bach - Busoni was equally committed to a vision of music's future, best summarized in his inspirational Outline for a New Aesthetic of Music, first published in 1907. In it, Busoni accurately predicts nearly every major development in music through the twentieth century and beyond.

"Music was born free and to win freedom its destiny," Busoni proclaimed in the essay; but with that freedom, he realized, comes the need for rigor. Busoni developed a mature compositional style that was indebted to Bach's counterpoint, and which forms the basis of the Fantasy. But Busoni's harmony is unexpected, and alluringly ambiguous. Because he looked simultaneously to past and future, Busoni's "sound" always seems perched on a stylistic divide.

Busoni considered the Fantasy his most significant solo piano piece, and he rethought aspects of the work in the 1920s for an equally important two-piano version. It is "about" Bach's unfinished masterwork The Art of Fugue. As a prelude, Busoni writes a loose set of chorale variations on a Lutheran hymn, a trembling evocation of the idea of Bach - and then Bach himself arrives, as the last, multi-subject fugue from The Art is presented in Busoni's unique transcription, with pungent modern harmonies added. Bach's work trails off as the third fugue subject incorporates the letters of the composer's own name (in the German musical spelling, B-A-C-H starts with B-flat and ends with B-natural), and then Busoni completes Bach's third fugue as well as the projected fourth. From the start, Busoni conceived the Fantasy as a monumental form, and portrayed it in a drawing as a building - an edifice to Bach's legacy - with columns representing all sections of the work. The Fantasy is clearly a showpiece, but its Gothic and Baroque sacred architecture also houses Busoni's more contemplative, mystical communion with Bach.

What is a public epic of music, and what is a private one?

-Jacob Greenberg, from The Liner Notes

Executive Producer: Jacob Greenberg
Session Producer: Ryan Streber
Editing Producer: Jacob Greenberg
Recording Engineer: Ryan Streber www.oktavenaudio.com
Digital Editing, Mixing, Post-Production: Ryan Streber
CD Design: Jill Malek www.jillmalek.com
Photography: Jessica Slaven www.jessicaslaven.com
Piano Technician: Arlan Harris www.arlanharris.com

All works recorded at Oktaven Audio, Yonkers, NY. Schumann recorded December 21-22, 2010, Busoni recorded January 8-9, 2011. Steinway piano.

Special thanks to Hinda Greenberg, David Greenberg, Ryan Streber, Jessica Slaven, Daniel Lippel, Claire Chase, ICE, Matthew Goulet, Arielle Javitch and Gus Powell, John Pendergast, and Brian Knight. This recording was aided by generous fiscal sponsorship from the New York Foundation for the Arts.

Jacob Greenberg

Pianist Jacob Greenberg's work as a soloist and chamber musician has received worldwide acclaim. A longtime member of the International Contemporary Ensemble, he has performed throughout the Americas and Europe. His solo concert series, Music at Close Range, shows his equal commitment to classics of the repertoire.

Recent highlights include a guest performance of works of György Kurtág at the International Summer Courses in Darmstadt, Germany, under the composer's guidance; concerts at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival; Boulez’s Sur Incises with the Seattle Symphony; and solo and concerto appearances with the International Contemporary Ensemble at Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival. Live performances have been heard on WQXR New York, BBC Radio 3, WFMT Chicago and Radio Netherlands.

As an orchestral player, Mr. Greenberg has appeared with the New York Philharmonic, Israel Philharmonic, and Australian Chamber Orchestra. He performs often with the Chicago Symphony’s MusicNOW. A leading pianist of modern song, he has toured extensively with soprano Tony Arnold; their 2013 recording of Olivier Messiaen's Harawi has been singled out by critics. Mr. Greenberg is also recognized as a coach for contemporary opera.

In addition to his solo albums for New Focus Recordings, which feature works from the Baroque to many new commissions, he has recorded for the Nonesuch, Sony, Bridge, Naxos, Mode, Kairos, Centaur, Tzadik, and New Amsterdam labels. Mr. Greenberg is an award-winning record producer, and has completed discs for major domestic and international labels. He is the director of the International Contemporary Ensemble's in-house TUNDRA imprint. As a composer, he makes recorded pieces with spoken and sung texts. His podcast, Intégrales, explores meaningful intersections of music and daily city life.

Mr. Greenberg is on the faculty of the Tanglewood Music Center, and has taught at Hunter College, City University of New York, The Juilliard School, and the State University of New York at Buffalo. He is a graduate of Oberlin College, where he earned degrees in music and religion, and he completed his master's and doctoral degrees at Northwestern University, where he studied with Ursula Oppens. Please visit jacobgreenberg.net.

http://www.jacobgreenberg.net

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