![]() The Canadian pianist Glenn Gould recorded what has become the most famous version of the monumental work.ĩ. The work opens with a simple statement of the theme (the ‘aria’) and the 30 variations get more and more intricate, straying further and further from the original theme. Read more: 10 of Bach’s all-time best pieces of musicīach’s 30 variations on a theme were originally written to help a Russian count overcome his insomnia – and they are named after a keyboard player called Johann Gottlieb Goldberg, who may have been the very musician who played the Variations to help the count drift off to sleep. Each of the two books contain 24 Preludes and Fugues (the whole work is sometimes known as ‘The 48’), in each key of the Western scale – and each book opens with a prelude in C major, closing with a fugue in B minor. Bach wrote the first of the two books that make up his work in 1722, making this one of the earliest pieces on our list. The Well-Tempered Clavier was completely innovative for its day, and it paved the way for composers writing for keyboard instruments for the next few hundred years. The most famous, ‘Traumerei’ paints a peaceful musical picture of a child’s dreams. Schumann’s Kinderszenen are a bittersweet collection of piano miniatures covering themes like games of chase, night-time terrors, bedtime stories and sleep. And just listen to the power packed into her Piano Trio for piano, cello and violin.Ħ. Her Viola Sonata is considered one of the greatest pieces ever written for the instrument. Her music is always thrilling, experimental and enormously powerful. Rebecca Clarke was a 20th-century British composer, who trained at the Royal Academy of Music and Royal College of Music in London before crossing the pond and spending the rest of her life in America. The build-up from the main theme and waltz-like accompaniment to the dramatic trill-filled finale makes the Nocturne in E-flat Major a strong contender for the most beautiful piano work ever written. 2)Ĭhopin composed his most well-known nocturne at the tender age of 20, which perhaps accounts for its youthful passion. Read more: 10 of Claude Debussy’s greatest pieces of musicĤ. Get it right, and it allows the most accomplished pianists to shine. Don’t be fooled by the initial simplicity of ‘Clair de Lune’: it took Debussy 15 years to write the third movement of the Suite Bergamasque, and the result is a work that sounds simple, but demands the very best from its performers. Read more: The 20 best piano concertos of all timeĬuriously, ‘Clair de Lune’ also means ‘Moonlight’ – but there’s a stark contrast between Beethoven’s Romantic classicism and Debussy’s Impressionism. This beautiful piano concerto gives us an idea of her incredible pianism and musical imagination. Read more: Yo-Yo Ma on how Bach’s Cello Suite No.Clara Schumann was one of the best known pianists of her time, but sadly she moved away from composing, saying " I once believed that I possessed creative talent, but I have given up this idea a woman must not desire to compose – there has never yet been one able to do it. They are remarkable not only for the way Bach makes his solo line dance and move, but also for their human quality, with every movement feeling like an exploration and a deep emotional journey.Īll six suites are incredible, and can be enjoyed as a set – but it’s the flowing, story-telling broken chords of the Prelude to the first suite which hold a unique power over players and listeners alike. Each suite is for solo cello and comprises a prelude followed by movements based on Baroque dance forms. ![]() ![]() These six extraordinary works tower over the entire cello repertoire and are both the starting point and the musical zenith, for any solo cellist.īaroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach wrote these works between 17, at a time of great artistic happiness while Kapellmeister in Köthen. ![]() What are the best works written for cello? Step this way for the most striking, stirring and inspiring works ever written for this beautiful instrument.
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