Piano Recital: Kit Armstrong plays Wagner, Liszt and Mozart | Margravial Opera House Bayreuth 2019 DW Classical Music 317 χιλ. εγγεγραμμένοι

A piano concert that could also double as a promotional film for the city of Bayreuth. On July 24, 2019, Kit Armstrong gave a piano recital in the fabulous halls of the Margravial Opera House in Bayreuth, featuring pieces by Richard Wagner, Franz Liszt, and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

 

 (00:00) Wagner, Piano Sonata in A flat major (for M. Wesendonck), WWV 85 (11:48) Liszt, Au bord d´une source (16.28) Liszt, Sonnet No.123 (Three Sonnets of Petrach) (22:45) Liszt, Aux cyprès de la Villa d´Este (32:35) Liszt, Les jeux d´eaux (41:30) Liszt, Piano Sonata in B minor (1:13:25) Mozart, Fantasy in C minor, K.475 (1:26:20) Mozart “Ave verum corpus” (transcription by Franz Liszt) (1:29:05) Mozart, Suite in C major, K.399 

 

 

Kit Armstrong will perform the first five pieces on a historic 1890 Bayreuth Steingraeber grand piano; the next four pieces will be played on a modern concert grand piano from the same traditional Bayreuth manufacturer for a sound comparison.

The program includes the Sonata in A flat major by Richard Wagner, which the composer dedicated to his muse Mathilde Wesendonck, as well as four romantic piano pieces from Franz Liszt's "Années de pèlerinage," or the "Pilgrim Years." These are followed by Franz Liszt's Piano Sonata in B minor, which he dedicated to the German composer and music critic Robert Schumann—whose wife, Clara, criticized the work in a diary entry, describing the piece as "dreadful."

Franz Liszt's Piano Sonata in B minor is the first piece played on the modern grand piano, followed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's ambitious Fantasy in C minor from 1785. Kit Armstrong plays Mozart's motet "Ave verum corpus" as a piano arrangement composed by Franz Liszt. The last piece we’ll hear is the Suite in C major by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the Austrian composer’s homage to the baroque music of Bach and Handel—pretty fitting for such a historic backdrop.

The setting for this piano recital couldn’t be more beautiful: The Margravial Opera House in Bayreuth is an opulent, baroque theater that has been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2012—and it’s one of the most beautiful in the world.

American pianist Kit Armstrong was born in 1992 and was considered an exceptional talent and prodigy from an early age. Since 2013, he's been performing in the world's greatest concert halls and has played alongside some of the most renowned orchestras. He has been composing music across a variety of genres since childhood, and he performs on the organ as well as the piano.