Idil Biret Beethoven Edition.11

Idil Biret Archive (IBA) In November 1949, at the age of eight, Idil Biret entered the studios of ORTF . (Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française / French Radio and Television IDIL BIRET BEETHOVEN EDITION 11 Broadcasting) in Paris and made her first recordings. These were works by Couperin, Bach, Beethoven and Debussy. In the following decades she made over eighty LPs and CDs (released on ten record labels - Pretoria, Véga, Decca, Atlantic/Finnadar, Pantheon, EMI, Naxos, Marco Polo, Alpha, BMP) and many recordings for radio and television stations around the world. These included the complete piano works of Brahms, Chopin and Rachmaninov and the Etudes of Ligeti. The Idil Biret Archive (IBA) will bring together as many of her recordings as possible; as the copyrights are obtained, old recordings no longer available commercially will be released together with her new recordings. The transcriptions by Liszt of Beethoven’s Symphonies, originally recorded for EMI, and the newly recorded 32 Sonatas and all the Piano Concertos of Beethoven will be the first to be released on nineteen CDs. Then, all the Piano Concertos of Liszt, Tchaikovsky, Schumann and Grieg and the nine LPs recorded for Atlantic/Finnadar in New York, including works by Boulez, Webern, Berg, Ravel and Stravinsky will follow. IBA will be distributed worldwide by Naxos on CD and on all major websites digitally. BEETHOVEN

(This CD is a joint production with Bilkent University’s BMP label) Piano Concertos Vol. 3

Concerto No. 5 in E flat major, Op. 73 (Emperor) The IBA emblem contains an etching by Albrecht Dürer sent to Idil Biret at Christmas 1959 Choral Fantasia in C minor, Op. 80 by Nadia Boulanger with the following words: Bilkent Symphony Orchestra

“To my little Idil. Christmas 1959. May the Angel protect her on the beautiful and dangerous Antoni Wit path she has engaged herself in. With all my heart. N.B ”

8.571261

8.571261booklet.indd 1-2 6/1/2009 10:48:32 AM Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) Bilkent Symphony Orchestra Piano Concertos, Volume 3 No. 5 in E flat major, Op. 73 (Emperor) The Bilkent Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1993 as an original artistic project of Bilkent Fantasia for Piano, Chorus and Orchestra in C minor, Op. 80 University. Developed by the Faculty of Music and Performing Arts, the orchestra is composed of over a hundred skilled artists and academics of the Faculty from Turkey and twelve other countries. The Bilkent Symphony Orchestra is the first private, international and academic, artistic ensemble in Turkey. Thayer informs us that Beethoven’s compositions of 1809 were headed by Concerto No. 5 for Pianoforte Starting as the Bilkent Sinfonietta, the symphony orchestra now has the identity of an ensemble of and Orchestra in E flat major, Op.73, and that “the first sketches for the Concerto dedicated to Archduke orchestras, comprising the Bilkent Chamber Orchestra, an Ensemble of Wind Instruments, and various Rudolph are to be found in the so-called Grasnick sketchbook after the sketches for the Choral Fantasia, other orchestral formations. With Turkish and foreign guest conductors, soloists and choirs, the ensemble as it was performed for the first time on 22nd December, 1808 … Like the later-composed pianoforte of orchestras has distinguished itself through its season of over eighty concerts a year and the television introduction to the Fantasia, these sketches belong to the early part of the year 1809 … The work was and radio broadcasts of these performances. The national label Bilkent Music Production has released finished by the end of the year; the autograph in the Berlin State Library has the inscription ‘Klavier over thirty CDs of the orchestra’s concerts. The orchestra’s latest recordings are released on labels such Conzert 1809. von LvBthwn’”. This is confirmed by one, Gustav Nottebohm, who describes Beethoven’s as EMI, CPO, BMP and Naxos. Through events such as the Bilkent Concert Series, Turkish Composers studies with Haydn, counterpoint with Albrechtsberger and sketchbooks generally. The majority of the Week, Education Concerts and The Bilkent International Anatolia Music Festival, the orchestra aims to Concerto’s sketches are in the Meinert sketchbook, while some 27 sheets remain in the Berlin Library. bring a wide range of activities to large audiences, to spread the appreciation of music at national level, Apparently Beethoven first mentioned it to Breitkopf and Härtel on 4th February, 1810, but the work’s undertake international activities and develop cooperation with institutions abroad. In furtherance of these printing had to wait until February 1811. In between, at the close of 1810, Johann Schneider first performed objectives the orchestra has undertaken concert tours to Italy (1998), Germany (2000), Belgium (2001), the work in public. The press reported that the numerous audience went into ‘a state of enthusiasm that it Portugal (2000) and Switzerland (2002-2004 Montreux Festival). In February 2004 the orchestra toured could hardly content itself with the ordinary expressions of recognition and enjoyment’. to Tokyo (Japan). Continuing its 2007-08 concert season under the artistic direction of Işın Metin with music director Emil Tabakov, the orchestra and its ensembles will be welcoming audiences at the Bilkent The subsequent revisions to the Concerto and Choral Fantasia, as well as the Piano Sonata Op. 81a, Concert Hall (800) and Bilkent ODEON (4000) in Ankara and Bilkent Concert Hall (300) in Erzurum. various songs and the oratorio Christ on the Mount of Olives, were accompanied by Beethoven’s apologies To mark the Centennial of the Turkish composer Adnan Saygun’s birth, Bilkent Symphony Orchestra has for ‘two weeks again, with his ‘tormenting headache’, but shortly afterwards he wrote: ‘Your Imperial presented a series of concerts during its 2006-07 and 2007-08 seasons featuring the composer’s works in Highness! Since despite all my exertions I could find no copyist who would work at my house, I am collaboration with the Bilkent Adnan Saygun Centre for Music Research. sending you my manuscript’… and imploring him to ‘Keep me graciously in your memory. Times will come when I shall show you two and threefold that I am worthy of it’. Among Beethoven’s benefactors was Prince von Klinsky who, with the aid of mediators praising the composer, was requested to make good notes of redemption, the payment of arrears and future sums in full. This was in the year 1812, and we have the sage comments of the popular author Sir Walter Scott: ‘It is seldom that the same circle of personages, who have surrounded an individual at his first outset in life, continue to have an interest in his career till his fate comes to a crisis…’ Beethoven’s older retinue of friends remained constant in their affections, but they were less useful to him because he was not performing as a pianist on the circuit of the rich upper classes. December 1808 marked the composer-pianist’s nearly thirty years of concert appearances that had started in Cologne as a prodigy.

8.571261booklet.indd 2-3 6/1/2009 10:48:32 AM Antoni Wit According to how we view Beethoven’s works for keyboard and orchestra individually, the ‘Emperor’ Concerto, dedicated to the man who became his pupil and protector, marks a departure from the Antoni Wit, one of the most highly regarded Polish conductors, studied conducting with Henryk composer’s classical period into the new exciting sound vista of the Romantic era. The first and third Czyz and composition with Krzysztof Penderecki at the Academy of Music in Kraków, subsequently movements personify the dramatic clashes between solo piano and orchestra, while the calm central continuing his studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. He also graduated in law at the Jagellonian Adagio has the orchestral part carry the melody while the pianist comments and decorates, conserving University in Kraków. Immediately after completing his studies he was engaged as an assistant at the his energies for the boisterous Grand Finale. Orchestral tuttis mark the pianist’s cadenza like flourishes, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra by Witold Rowicki and was later appointed conductor of the Poznan and thereafter, for a period of four or five minutes, the orchestral players strut forth in military style, Philharmonic, collaborated with the Warsaw Grand Theatre, and from 1974 to 1977 was artistic director albeit with a brief minor episode with turns and pizzicati against an ominous and sinister augmentation of the Pomeranian Philharmonic, before his appointment as director of the Polish Radio and Television lower down the stave. The atmosphere keenly states a predominant mastery in taking a fairly obvious Orchestra and Chorus in Kraków, from 1977 to 1983. From 1983 to 2000 he was the director of the theme and turning it all ways. Wind solos bring back the pianist, who indulges in pretty much the same National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice, and from 1987 to 1992 he was the chief exercise, albeit pirouetting the theme in straightforward fashion, on its head, segmenting and augmenting conductor and then first guest conductor of Orquesta Filarmónica de Gran Canaria. In 2002 he became it in turn. During delightful asides from solo bassoon and flute, we settle briefly in C minor with an General and Artistic Director of the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra. His international career has brought interweaving theme from the pianist against plucked strings that slides suddenly back into the tonic. engagements with major orchestras throughout Europe, the Americas and the Near and Far East. He For Beethoven, this is the sign for some devil-may-care fun-making with the pianist taking centre stage. has made nearly a hundred records, including an acclaimed release for Naxos of the piano concertos of Flaunting, subdividing and re-presenting the framework of his material, he presents a grand exposition of Prokofiev, awarded the Diapason d’Or and Grand Prix du Disque de la Nouvelle Académie du Disque. changing major-minor sequences that literally surround his main subject. Then he does the unexpected. In January 2002 his recording of the Turangalîla Symphony by Olivier Messiaen (8.554478-79) was By mirroring and slightly slowing the pace, he builds his resources up again, carefully. Gradually, with awarded the Cannes Classical Award in Midem Classic 2002. In 2004 he received the Classical Internet winds interjecting theme fragments against an arpeggio piano backwash, he creates an upward thrust of Award and was nominated for a Grammy for his Naxos recording of Penderecki’s St Luke Passion continuity that plunges back to the work’s opening in heroic style. One senses the composer’s allegiances (8.557149), with a further nomination in 2005 for Penderecki’s Polish Requiem (8.557386-87). Antoni to his other E flat major masterwork, the ‘Eroica’ Symphony. But here, celebratory plaudits are directed Wit is a professor at the F. Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw. to himself and his choice of keyboard interpreter; certainly not to any political assassin. The remainder of the movement, including the brief, uplifting cadenza (not quite at the end of proceedings) confirm the correctness of his viewpoint. The sublime Adagio un poco mosso slow movement with its bestilled atmosphere of wafting breezes is the perfect example of how a composer, by slowing and softening his forces, can produce the opposite effect to his previous movement. Series of upward piano trills awaken our attention to the droplet passages that precede them, and the long sustained descent and modulation towards the start of the Rondo Allegro Finale is indeed masterly. Beethoven at his most assertive – I have nothing but praise for the opening phrase linked to its trilling answering call, but whether commentators have successfully summed up the sheer variations of mood, key contrasting, defined moments or that sheer devilry that causes the listener to jump out of his seat in sheer ecstasy, I very much doubt. It is unique and quite unparalleled. The final linkedcadenza at the close brings jubilation from all concerned.

For an obvious example of Beethoven’s free variation format we turn to the Choral Fantasia, Op.80. To describe it in Thayer’s words it is a Fantasia for the Pianoforte which ends with the gradual entrance of the entire orchestra and the introduction of choruses as a finale. The composer worked considerably on

8.571261booklet.indd 4-5 6/1/2009 10:48:32 AM it to make it fit for performance, evidence the first 75 pages in the Grasnick sketchbook. Interestingly, Idil Biret Nottebohm tells us that there was no hint of a pianoforte introduction that Beethoven improvised at the first 1808 performance; he preferred beginning with a string quartet from select orchestral players. Work Born in Ankara, Idil Biret started to play the piano at the age of three and later studied at the Paris commenced before a text was selected, and the composer favoured paving the way by introducing voices Conservatoire under the guidance of Nadia Boulanger, graduating at the age of fifteen with three first by words calling the attention of newcomers from the harmonious party – Nottebohm suspecting that prizes. She was a pupil of Alfred Cortot and a lifelong disciple of Wilhelm Kempff. She embarked on her Treitschke wrote them according to the composer’s edict. At the first performance, the introductory piano career as a soloist at the age of sixteen, appearing with major orchestras in the principal music centres of fantasia took the place of Beethoven’s improvisation in accordance to the published score. The dedication the world in collaboration with conductors of the greatest distinction. To many major festival appearances is to Maximilian Joseph, King of Bavaria. may be added membership of juries for international competitions including the Van Cliburn, Queen Elisabeth of Belgium and Busoni competitions. She has received the Lili Boulanger memorial Award in Often compared to the Ninth Symphony, the Choral Fantasia was chosen to be the final item to follow Boston, the Harriet Cohen / Dinu Lipatti Gold Medal in London, the Polish Artistic Merit Award and the the Fifth Symphony in the same key. The structure is: Adagio (C minor for piano solo), Finale – Allegro Distinguished Service Medals, the Adelaide Ristori Prize in Italy, the French Chevalier de l’Ordre national (the reason for ‘finale’ is not clear), Meno allegro (C minor), Adagio, ma non troppo (A major), Marcia, du Mérite and the State Artist distinction in Turkey. Her more than eighty records since the 1960s include assai vivace (F major, alla breve), Allegro (C minor), Allegretto, ma non troppo; Presto (Coda). The text the first recordings of Liszt’s transcriptions of the Nine Symphonies of Beethoven for EMI, Berlioz’s has been attributed to the poet Christoph Kuffner. Symphonie Fantastique for Atlantic / Finnadar and for Naxos the complete piano works of Brahms, Chopin, Rachmaninov, the three Sonatas of Boulez, the Etudes of Ligeti and the complete Firebird piano The Choral Fantasia starts with a solo piano introduction, leading to a series of free and then strict transcriptions by Stravinsky, with a Marco Polo disc of the piano compositions and transcriptions of variations. Repeated patterings in the piano part come between stern C minor chords; gradually the her mentor Wilhelm Kempff. Idil Biret has also recorded the 32 Sonatas and all the Piano Concertos of emphasis recedes but returns again. Pizzicato strings, then wind instruments appear against a recitative-like Beethoven. Her Chopin recordings received a Grand Prix du Disque Frédéric Chopin award in Poland subject from the pianist. French horns, solo piano and horns sing out the main theme. Skipping solo flute and the Boulez recording the Golden Diapason of the year award in France. In 2007 the Polish President and oboes echo in repetition. Clarinets intervene in harmony, then strings, with sparer scoring, followed decorated Biret with the Distinguished Service Order – Cavalry Cross for her contribution to Polish by the full orchestra. The pianist becomes more assertive. Following piano trills, the orchestra answers culture through her recordings and performances of Chopin’s music. in march-style. There is a C minor episode with the pianist changing keys. Concerted divided voices sing out the main subject, then the full choir is heard, leading to a Presto coda. Bill Newman

8.571261booklet.indd 6-7 6/1/2009 10:48:32 AM it to make it fit for performance, evidence the first 75 pages in the Grasnick sketchbook. Interestingly, Idil Biret Nottebohm tells us that there was no hint of a pianoforte introduction that Beethoven improvised at the first 1808 performance; he preferred beginning with a string quartet from select orchestral players. Work Born in Ankara, Idil Biret started to play the piano at the age of three and later studied at the Paris commenced before a text was selected, and the composer favoured paving the way by introducing voices Conservatoire under the guidance of Nadia Boulanger, graduating at the age of fifteen with three first by words calling the attention of newcomers from the harmonious party – Nottebohm suspecting that prizes. She was a pupil of Alfred Cortot and a lifelong disciple of Wilhelm Kempff. She embarked on her Treitschke wrote them according to the composer’s edict. At the first performance, the introductory piano career as a soloist at the age of sixteen, appearing with major orchestras in the principal music centres of fantasia took the place of Beethoven’s improvisation in accordance to the published score. The dedication the world in collaboration with conductors of the greatest distinction. To many major festival appearances is to Maximilian Joseph, King of Bavaria. may be added membership of juries for international competitions including the Van Cliburn, Queen Elisabeth of Belgium and Busoni competitions. She has received the Lili Boulanger memorial Award in Often compared to the Ninth Symphony, the Choral Fantasia was chosen to be the final item to follow Boston, the Harriet Cohen / Dinu Lipatti Gold Medal in London, the Polish Artistic Merit Award and the the Fifth Symphony in the same key. The structure is: Adagio (C minor for piano solo), Finale – Allegro Distinguished Service Medals, the Adelaide Ristori Prize in Italy, the French Chevalier de l’Ordre national (the reason for ‘finale’ is not clear), Meno allegro (C minor), Adagio, ma non troppo (A major), Marcia, du Mérite and the State Artist distinction in Turkey. Her more than eighty records since the 1960s include assai vivace (F major, alla breve), Allegro (C minor), Allegretto, ma non troppo; Presto (Coda). The text the first recordings of Liszt’s transcriptions of the Nine Symphonies of Beethoven for EMI, Berlioz’s has been attributed to the poet Christoph Kuffner. Symphonie Fantastique for Atlantic / Finnadar and for Naxos the complete piano works of Brahms, Chopin, Rachmaninov, the three Sonatas of Boulez, the Etudes of Ligeti and the complete Firebird piano The Choral Fantasia starts with a solo piano introduction, leading to a series of free and then strict transcriptions by Stravinsky, with a Marco Polo disc of the piano compositions and transcriptions of variations. Repeated patterings in the piano part come between stern C minor chords; gradually the her mentor Wilhelm Kempff. Idil Biret has also recorded the 32 Sonatas and all the Piano Concertos of emphasis recedes but returns again. Pizzicato strings, then wind instruments appear against a recitative-like Beethoven. Her Chopin recordings received a Grand Prix du Disque Frédéric Chopin award in Poland subject from the pianist. French horns, solo piano and horns sing out the main theme. Skipping solo flute and the Boulez recording the Golden Diapason of the year award in France. In 2007 the Polish President and oboes echo in repetition. Clarinets intervene in harmony, then strings, with sparer scoring, followed decorated Biret with the Distinguished Service Order – Cavalry Cross for her contribution to Polish by the full orchestra. The pianist becomes more assertive. Following piano trills, the orchestra answers culture through her recordings and performances of Chopin’s music. in march-style. There is a C minor episode with the pianist changing keys. Concerted divided voices sing out the main subject, then the full choir is heard, leading to a Presto coda. Bill Newman

8.571261booklet.indd 6-7 6/1/2009 10:48:32 AM Antoni Wit According to how we view Beethoven’s works for keyboard and orchestra individually, the ‘Emperor’ Concerto, dedicated to the man who became his pupil and protector, marks a departure from the Antoni Wit, one of the most highly regarded Polish conductors, studied conducting with Henryk composer’s classical period into the new exciting sound vista of the Romantic era. The first and third Czyz and composition with Krzysztof Penderecki at the Academy of Music in Kraków, subsequently movements personify the dramatic clashes between solo piano and orchestra, while the calm central continuing his studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. He also graduated in law at the Jagellonian Adagio has the orchestral part carry the melody while the pianist comments and decorates, conserving University in Kraków. Immediately after completing his studies he was engaged as an assistant at the his energies for the boisterous Grand Finale. Orchestral tuttis mark the pianist’s cadenza like flourishes, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra by Witold Rowicki and was later appointed conductor of the Poznan and thereafter, for a period of four or five minutes, the orchestral players strut forth in military style, Philharmonic, collaborated with the Warsaw Grand Theatre, and from 1974 to 1977 was artistic director albeit with a brief minor episode with turns and pizzicati against an ominous and sinister augmentation of the Pomeranian Philharmonic, before his appointment as director of the Polish Radio and Television lower down the stave. The atmosphere keenly states a predominant mastery in taking a fairly obvious Orchestra and Chorus in Kraków, from 1977 to 1983. From 1983 to 2000 he was the director of the theme and turning it all ways. Wind solos bring back the pianist, who indulges in pretty much the same National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice, and from 1987 to 1992 he was the chief exercise, albeit pirouetting the theme in straightforward fashion, on its head, segmenting and augmenting conductor and then first guest conductor of Orquesta Filarmónica de Gran Canaria. In 2002 he became it in turn. During delightful asides from solo bassoon and flute, we settle briefly in C minor with an General and Artistic Director of the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra. His international career has brought interweaving theme from the pianist against plucked strings that slides suddenly back into the tonic. engagements with major orchestras throughout Europe, the Americas and the Near and Far East. He For Beethoven, this is the sign for some devil-may-care fun-making with the pianist taking centre stage. has made nearly a hundred records, including an acclaimed release for Naxos of the piano concertos of Flaunting, subdividing and re-presenting the framework of his material, he presents a grand exposition of Prokofiev, awarded the Diapason d’Or and Grand Prix du Disque de la Nouvelle Académie du Disque. changing major-minor sequences that literally surround his main subject. Then he does the unexpected. In January 2002 his recording of the Turangalîla Symphony by Olivier Messiaen (8.554478-79) was By mirroring and slightly slowing the pace, he builds his resources up again, carefully. Gradually, with awarded the Cannes Classical Award in Midem Classic 2002. In 2004 he received the Classical Internet winds interjecting theme fragments against an arpeggio piano backwash, he creates an upward thrust of Award and was nominated for a Grammy for his Naxos recording of Penderecki’s St Luke Passion continuity that plunges back to the work’s opening in heroic style. One senses the composer’s allegiances (8.557149), with a further nomination in 2005 for Penderecki’s Polish Requiem (8.557386-87). Antoni to his other E flat major masterwork, the ‘Eroica’ Symphony. But here, celebratory plaudits are directed Wit is a professor at the F. Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw. to himself and his choice of keyboard interpreter; certainly not to any political assassin. The remainder of the movement, including the brief, uplifting cadenza (not quite at the end of proceedings) confirm the correctness of his viewpoint. The sublime Adagio un poco mosso slow movement with its bestilled atmosphere of wafting breezes is the perfect example of how a composer, by slowing and softening his forces, can produce the opposite effect to his previous movement. Series of upward piano trills awaken our attention to the droplet passages that precede them, and the long sustained descent and modulation towards the start of the Rondo Allegro Finale is indeed masterly. Beethoven at his most assertive – I have nothing but praise for the opening phrase linked to its trilling answering call, but whether commentators have successfully summed up the sheer variations of mood, key contrasting, defined moments or that sheer devilry that causes the listener to jump out of his seat in sheer ecstasy, I very much doubt. It is unique and quite unparalleled. The final linkedcadenza at the close brings jubilation from all concerned.

8.571261booklet.indd 4-5 6/1/2009 10:48:32 AM Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) Bilkent Symphony Orchestra Piano Concertos, Volume 3 No. 5 in E flat major, Op. 73 (Emperor) The Bilkent Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1993 as an original artistic project of Bilkent Fantasia for Piano, Chorus and Orchestra in C minor, Op. 80 University. Developed by the Faculty of Music and Performing Arts, the orchestra is composed of over a hundred skilled artists and academics of the Faculty from Turkey and twelve other countries. The Bilkent Symphony Orchestra is the first private, international and academic, artistic ensemble in Turkey. Thayer informs us that Beethoven’s compositions of 1809 were headed by Concerto No. 5 for Pianoforte Starting as the Bilkent Sinfonietta, the symphony orchestra now has the identity of an ensemble of and Orchestra in E flat major, Op.73, and that “the first sketches for the Concerto dedicated to Archduke orchestras, comprising the Bilkent Chamber Orchestra, an Ensemble of Wind Instruments, and various Rudolph are to be found in the so-called Grasnick sketchbook after the sketches for the Choral Fantasia, other orchestral formations. With Turkish and foreign guest conductors, soloists and choirs, the ensemble as it was performed for the first time on 22nd December, 1808 … Like the later-composed pianoforte of orchestras has distinguished itself through its season of over eighty concerts a year and the television introduction to the Fantasia, these sketches belong to the early part of the year 1809 … The work was and radio broadcasts of these performances. The national label Bilkent Music Production has released finished by the end of the year; the autograph in the Berlin State Library has the inscription ‘Klavier over thirty CDs of the orchestra’s concerts. The orchestra’s latest recordings are released on labels such Conzert 1809. von LvBthwn’”. This is confirmed by one, Gustav Nottebohm, who describes Beethoven’s as EMI, CPO, BMP and Naxos. Through events such as the Bilkent Concert Series, Turkish Composers studies with Haydn, counterpoint with Albrechtsberger and sketchbooks generally. The majority of the Week, Education Concerts and The Bilkent International Anatolia Music Festival, the orchestra aims to Concerto’s sketches are in the Meinert sketchbook, while some 27 sheets remain in the Berlin Library. bring a wide range of activities to large audiences, to spread the appreciation of music at national level, Apparently Beethoven first mentioned it to Breitkopf and Härtel on 4th February, 1810, but the work’s undertake international activities and develop cooperation with institutions abroad. In furtherance of these printing had to wait until February 1811. In between, at the close of 1810, Johann Schneider first performed objectives the orchestra has undertaken concert tours to Italy (1998), Germany (2000), Belgium (2001), the work in public. The press reported that the numerous audience went into ‘a state of enthusiasm that it Portugal (2000) and Switzerland (2002-2004 Montreux Festival). In February 2004 the orchestra toured could hardly content itself with the ordinary expressions of recognition and enjoyment’. to Tokyo (Japan). Continuing its 2007-08 concert season under the artistic direction of Işın Metin with music director Emil Tabakov, the orchestra and its ensembles will be welcoming audiences at the Bilkent The subsequent revisions to the Concerto and Choral Fantasia, as well as the Piano Sonata Op. 81a, Concert Hall (800) and Bilkent ODEON (4000) in Ankara and Bilkent Concert Hall (300) in Erzurum. various songs and the oratorio Christ on the Mount of Olives, were accompanied by Beethoven’s apologies To mark the Centennial of the Turkish composer Adnan Saygun’s birth, Bilkent Symphony Orchestra has for ‘two weeks again, with his ‘tormenting headache’, but shortly afterwards he wrote: ‘Your Imperial presented a series of concerts during its 2006-07 and 2007-08 seasons featuring the composer’s works in Highness! Since despite all my exertions I could find no copyist who would work at my house, I am collaboration with the Bilkent Adnan Saygun Centre for Music Research. sending you my manuscript’… and imploring him to ‘Keep me graciously in your memory. Times will come when I shall show you two and threefold that I am worthy of it’. Among Beethoven’s benefactors was Prince von Klinsky who, with the aid of mediators praising the composer, was requested to make good notes of redemption, the payment of arrears and future sums in full. This was in the year 1812, and we have the sage comments of the popular author Sir Walter Scott: ‘It is seldom that the same circle of personages, who have surrounded an individual at his first outset in life, continue to have an interest in his career till his fate comes to a crisis…’ Beethoven’s older retinue of friends remained constant in their affections, but they were less useful to him because he was not performing as a pianist on the circuit of the rich upper classes. December 1808 marked the composer-pianist’s nearly thirty years of concert appearances that had started in Cologne as a prodigy.

8.571261booklet.indd 2-3 6/1/2009 10:48:32 AM Idil Biret Archive (IBA) In November 1949, at the age of eight, Idil Biret entered the studios of ORTF . (Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française / French Radio and Television IDIL BIRET BEETHOVEN EDITION 11 Broadcasting) in Paris and made her first recordings. These were works by Couperin, Bach, Beethoven and Debussy. In the following decades she made over eighty LPs and CDs (released on ten record labels - Pretoria, Véga, Decca, Atlantic/Finnadar, Pantheon, EMI, Naxos, Marco Polo, Alpha, BMP) and many recordings for radio and television stations around the world. These included the complete piano works of Brahms, Chopin and Rachmaninov and the Etudes of Ligeti. The Idil Biret Archive (IBA) will bring together as many of her recordings as possible; as the copyrights are obtained, old recordings no longer available commercially will be released together with her new recordings. The transcriptions by Liszt of Beethoven’s Symphonies, originally recorded for EMI, and the newly recorded 32 Sonatas and all the Piano Concertos of Beethoven will be the first to be released on nineteen CDs. Then, all the Piano Concertos of Liszt, Tchaikovsky, Schumann and Grieg and the nine LPs recorded for Atlantic/Finnadar in New York, including works by Boulez, Webern, Berg, Ravel and Stravinsky will follow. IBA will be distributed worldwide by Naxos on CD and on all major websites digitally. BEETHOVEN

(This CD is a joint production with Bilkent University’s BMP label) Piano Concertos Vol. 3

“To my little Idil. Christmas 1959. May the Angel protect her on the beautiful and dangerous Antoni Wit path she has engaged herself in. With all my heart. N.B ”

8.571261

8.571261booklet.indd 1-2 6/1/2009 10:48:32 AM Idil Biret BEETHOVEN EDITION . 11

Idil Biret Complete Piano Sonatas, Concertos and Symphony Transcriptions Idil Biret

“Biret grasps the size of Beethoven’s style. The polyphony is laid out in a relaxed way with little indulgence in point IBA011 making. She keeps the big line and yet is thankfully sparing in her use of fortissimos. The piano tone is sumptuous. Biret’s gentle and almost sensuous sonorities are really captivating. One is reminded that her mentor has been Wilhelm Kempff.” BEETHOVEN EDITION GRAMOPHONE BEETHOVEN EDITION 8.571261 “Idil Biret gives an impressive performance. A supreme mastery of tempi, sonorities, polyphony and technique permits Biret – a disciple of Alfred Cortot – to embrace all the moods of Beethoven and gives her playing a symphonic depth rarely heard until now.” Playing time LE NOUVEL OBSERVATEUR 62:51 “Idil Biret has recently recorded Liszt’s transcriptions of Beethoven’s nine Symphonies for EMI. Her superbly authentic performance of the 5th Symphony, heard at her Herkülessaal recital in Munich, received a thunderous reception.” MŰNCHNER MERKUR . .

11 Concerto in E flat major, Op. 73 (Emperor) 41:40 11 1 Allegro 21:28 Piano Concertos 5 (Vol. 3) 2 Adagio un poco mosso 09:11 Piano Concertos 5 (Vol. 3) 3 Rondo: Allegro 11:01 and distributed by Manufactured by Sonopress www.idilbiretarchive.eu Made in Germany Booklet notes in English & © 2009 Idil Biret Fantasia for Piano, Chorus and Orchestra in C minor, Op. 80 21:11 4 Allegro con brio 21:11

Özgecan Gencer, Soprano • Gülben Özışık Çayan, Soprano • Sema Baysal, Alto Can Serhat Saygı, Tenor • Ethem Demir, Tenor • Ali Sinan Gülsen, Bass Turkish State Polyphonic Chorus (Chorus master: Ibrahim Yazıcı) Bilkent Symphony Orchestra • Antoni Wit 8.571261 8.571261 Recorded: February 2008 at the Bilkent Symphony Hall in Ankara, Turkey Producer and Engineer: Günther Appenheimer Booklet notes: Bill Newman