Frederic Rzewski

Featuring: Ursula Oppens

2011 release ** "During the 1970s, the inspiring pianist Ursula Oppens commissioned Rzewski to write a set of variations that she would perform at Carnegie Hall together with Beethoven's Diabelli Variations. The result was a masterpiece of 20th century Romanticism, continuing the clear line from Beethoven through Brahms that faltered with the deaths of McDowell, Medtner, and Rachmaninov in the first half of the 20th century. Rzewski takes a catchy tune, a Chilean protest song, and pulls it apart in a multitude of ways, each subset of variations teasing the listener with increasingly remote references to the original melody. From time to time the effect verges on noise, only to be relieved by a lyrical or passionate return to harmony and tunefulness. As a set of variations, this piece deserves to be classed with the Diabelli Variations and Mendelssohn's equally outstanding Variations Serieuses. Oppens's performance of Rzewski's "The People United Will Never Be Defeated" was a justifiably famous landmark, doing full justice to the formidable challenge of bringing coherence to a work of such complexity."