Deutsche Grammophon celebrates World Piano Day
Live performance of Saint-Saëns’ “Piano Concerto No. 2” by Lang Lang with Gewandhausorchester and Andris Nelson will be broadcast on STAGE+ on World Piano Day, March 28, 2024.
Deutsche Grammophon is pleased to mark this year’s World Piano Day (Thursday, March 28, 2024) with an international piano festival. An extensive program featuring some of the label’s world-renowned pianists and rising stars will be available on the STAGE+ audiovisual platform. Non-subscribers can explore this and much more with 30 days of free access to STAGE+ using the promo code PIANODAY24. For more details, visit worldpianoday.com.
A highlight of this year’s pianistic celebrations will be the STAGE+ premiere of Lang Lang’s brilliant interpretation of Saint-Saëns’ Second Piano Concerto, filmed live in Leipzig with the Gewandhausorchester and Andris Nelsons. Lang Lang describes the work, which is included in his latest album, “Lang Lang – Saint Saëns”, as “a magnificent but underrated romantic masterpiece”. The stylistic diversity of the piece allows the pianist to reveal all facets of his technique. The Concert will be broadcast on STAGE+ at 7 pm (Mainland Portugal time) on World Piano Day, with two more showings on March 29th.
A selection of other concertos and recitals, spanning more than three centuries of keyboard music, are also available on STAGE+. Music lovers can enjoy, for example, a complete interpretation of Bach’s “Goldberg Variations” by Víkingur Ólafsson, whose DG recording and ongoing world tour of the monumental work have attracted five-star reviews. Or immerse yourself in the jazz and blues rhythms of Gershwin’s “Piano Concerto in F,” recorded during Daniil Trifonov’s recent Carnegie Hall concert with the NYO-USA All-Stars ensemble conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin. There are live interpretations of Rachmaninoff’s works for piano and orchestra by Yuja Wang with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Gustavo Dudamel and performances by Alice Sara Ott and Julius Asal. Other surprises include duets of Mozart, Schubert and Stravinsky by old friends Martha Argerich and Daniel Barenboim; Hélène Grimaud’s interpretation of Schumann’s “Kreisleriana” in the idyllic setting of Polling Abbey Library; and the return of Lang Lang, this time with his wife, Gina Alice, with Saint-Saëns’ “Carnival of the Animals”.
Deutsche Grammophon’s involvement in World Piano Day also includes an 80-minute film featuring incredible piano performances. It features the astonishing talent of no fewer than 22 pianists, including Kit Armstrong, Marie Awadis, Bruce Liu, Daniil Trifonov and rising stars Elisabeth Brauß, Fabian Müller and Robert Neumann, among others, including several of those mentioned above. The film will premiere on Deutsche Grammophon’s YouTube channel at 1 pm (Mainland time) on March 28th.
Deutsche Grammophon is also featuring its pianists in a selection of new tracks released to coincide with World Piano Day. Julius Asal plays compositions by Holst (“Mars, the Bringer of War”) and Scriabin (an excerpt from his DG debut album, “Scriabin – Scarlatti”, to be released on May 3rd); Bruce Liu performs Chopin’s Étude “Winter Wind”; Robert Neumann performs the Andante from Beethoven’s “Sonata in F minor, WoO 47 no. 2” by Beethoven, and there is the first opportunity to hear “Darkness of Night” from Viktor Orri Árnason’s upcoming five-song digital EP, “Piano Poems” (to be released on 12 Of april). Finally, two artists share new songs recorded especially for World Piano Day. Roger Eno created a piano reworking of the 1983 classic “Deep Blue Day,” while Joep Beving wrote the meditative “Pax,” a call for peace in today’s troubled world.
World Piano Day was founded by German composer, performer and producer Nils Frahm in 2015. Reflecting the number of keys on a full-sized piano, it takes place annually on the 88th day of the year.
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