Student Recital: Liszt, Mendelssohn

This week On Stage At Curtis features a student recital. The program:

Liszt: Étude No. 9 in A-flat major: Andantino (“Ricordanza”),
from Études d’exécution transcendante
Micah McLaurin, piano

Franz Liszt was a Hungarian composer and lived between 1811-1886. He composed a series of twelve compositions for solo piano called Études d’exécution transcendante and Étude No. 9 in A-flat major: Andantino (“Ricordanza”) is the ninth of the twelve. It is described as having a “wild but gentle cadenzas and demands delicate finger.”

Liszt: Funérailles, from Harmonies poétiques et religieuses
Micah McLaurin, piano

“A little bit like a song with a lot of glitter around it,” is how Micah McLaurin describes the Funérailles by Liszt. Funérailles is the seventh and most famous of the piano collection Harmonies poétiques et religieuses.

Mendelssohn: Quartet No. 2 in A minor, Op. 13
Maria Ioudenitch, violin; Adé Williams, violin; Erika Gray, viola and Chen Cao, cello

Felix Mendelssohn was eighteen years old when he wrote String Quartet No. 2
in A minor, Op. 13. He was very much influenced by Beethoven’s late quartets and you might be able to hear references to Beethoven in this piece. The movements are marked: Adagio—Allegro vivace; Adagio non lento; Intermezzo: Allegretto con moto and Presto—Adagio non lento.