Brahms: Klavierstucke. Op. 76. Rhapsodies. Op. 79. Piano Sonata Op.3. No.5

Third release by Peter Orth on Challenge Classics. After Scriabin/Rachmaninov (CC 72684) and Beethoven (CC 72634), Orth addresses Brahms. - Three great works are recorded here: the big Sonata op.5, actually the last one Brahms composed, and two masterworks of his maturity: Capriccios op.76 and Rhapsodies op.79

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Klassieke Zaken on CC 72684: the perfect balance between form and content, an expressive and melodious touch, flexible tension and organic phrasing.

Peter Orth: While it may seem that everything has been recorded in the classical canon, I've found there still is room for new interpretations. Oddly, the piano music of Johannes Brahms has by no means been exhausted.

In my experience with American music teaching, the great masters were very much handled with a certain distant reverence - when in actuality they need to be approached naturally. Coming to live in Germany where the composers lived and worked removes these pedestals in favor of understanding their lives in the context of their surroundings.

Having been in the same room to hear the likes of Callas, Baker, Bernstein, Celibidache, Horowitz, Rubinstein, Serkin, to mention only a few, showed me viscerally what kind of fire is involved in making a musical statement. Perhaps having been witness to a time now gone, arguably the last of the great performing generation, has informed in my ethos a kind of measuring stick against which to measure myself and be responsible to. Whether I can live up to any of it is not for me to say.