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Pianist Norman Krieger will perform a Beethoven piano concerto among other works in a concert with Serenata of Santa Fe.
Pianist Norman Krieger has played Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, Op. 58, with an orchestra many times during his 30-year career. When Krieger comes to Santa Fe on Friday to play this important concerto, he will have only five string players on stage with him.
Serenata of Santa Fe presents Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 with Krieger and a quintet that features violinists David Felberg and Elena Sopoci, violists Christof Huebner and Shanti Randall and cellist Sally Guenther.
“I don’t like the piano part in the string quintet version of the concerto, so I’m going to stay close to the piano part in the orchestral score,” Krieger said. “I’ve never performed the concerto with a string quintet before. It’s a first for me. I look at playing a concerto with an orchestra as chamber music on a large scale. This will be just a smaller chamber music experience for me. I think that Beethoven’s fourth is a chamber orchestra-oriented concerto, so it should work out well.”
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If you go WHAT: Serenata of Santa Fe presents Classic Drama with pianist Norman Krieger WHEN: 6 p.m. Friday, Nov. 16 WHERE: Scottish Rite Center, 463 Paseo de Peralta, Santa Fe HOW MUCH: $25 general admission, $20 seniors 65-plus, $10 students, $5 youths. At the door or online at www.serenataofsantafe.org. For more information call 505-989-7988 |
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In an interview with Serenata of Santa Fe’s artistic director Pamela Epple during the early fall, Epple explained how this version of the concerto came to be.
“This orchestration of Beethoven’s Concerto No. 4 is based on sketches that Beethoven did for piano and string quartet,” she said. “It’s becoming more acceptable to play the concerto this way.”
Friday night’s concert at the Scottish Rite Center also features Krieger playing solo works by Mozart, Lazarof and Chopin. He opens the performance with Mozart’s Piano Sonata No. 10 in C Major, which was written when the composer was 27 years old. It’s a long work, taking close to 20 minutes to play, but is considered one of Mozart’s most popular piano sonatas.
Six preludes written by contemporary Bulgarian composer Henri Lazarof follow Mozart’s sonata. Krieger played Lazarof’s entire group of 12 preludes in a concert last August in Colorado Springs.
“Lazarof is unique,” Krieger said. “He’s a pianist himself and so writes very pianistically. He leaves a lot of freedom to the performer. His music has a beautiful dissonance to it. There are many colors in it and a spectrum of sound. Moods are unpredictable and change often.”
A frequent performer in Santa Fe, Krieger regularly appears with orchestras throughout the world. This season he is a guest artist with Germany’s Philharmonisches Orchster Augsburg, Holland’s Orkest van het Oostenaand and Mexico’s Orquesta Sinfónica de Xalapa. His four recordings reflect his interest in the works of composers including Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Gershwin, Haydn, Brahms, Barber and Berg.
