Today My Classical Notes features a new recording by pianist Shai Wosner. It is titled “Impromptu”
The selections we hear are as follows:
Beethoven:
Fantasia in G minor, Op. 77
Chopin:
Impromptu No. 1 in A flat major, Op. 29
Impromptu No. 2 in F sharp major, Op. 36
Impromptu No. 3 in G flat major, Op. 51
Dvorak:
Impromptu in D minor, B129
Gershwin:
Impromptu in two Keys
Ives, C:
Three Improvisation, Nos 1 & 3
Liszt:
Impromptu S191 1872
Schubert:
4 Impromptus, D935
All performed by Shai Wosner (piano)
After his highly praised Haydn and Ligeti album, Shai Wosner returns to solo piano repertoire for his next project. As always with this artist, there is something very different on offer – Impromptus by Chopin, Dvorak, Liszt, Gershwin, and Schubert rub shoulders with Beethoven’s Fantasy Op.77 – the nearest thing we have to a Beethoven ‘improvisation’. The composer did indeed improvise this work at a private house performance, then went home and wrote it down from memory!
The pianist said:
“There is a rush that comes with losing yourself in an improvisation – the liberating feeling you get when that thing you are making up on the spot seems to take on a life of its own while you are just tagging along (there is also the thrill in the risk that whole thing might fall flat at any moment). I have loved it ever since”
Here is Mr. Wosner in the Impromptu Opus 36 by Chopin:
