Bolcom: Graceful Ghost

Brahms: Liebeslieder-Walzer, Op. 52

Ravel: La Valse (for 2 pianos)

Schubert: Fantasie in F minor for piano duet, D940

A ‘follow up’ to Leon Fleisher’s legendary ‘Two Hands’ recording, this release is a selection of piano duets performed with his wife Katherine Jacobson. The attractive repertoire includes Brahms’ ‘Liebeslieder’, Schubert’s ‘Fantasia’, Ravel’s ‘La Valse’ and Bolcom’s ‘Graceful Ghost Rag.’ Leon Fleisher is considered a living legend among the group of distinguished American pianists who emerged in the late forties and early fifties and is linked via Schnabel to a tradition that descended directly from Beethoven himself, handed down through Carl Czerny and Theodor Leschetizky In the mid-sixties, the onset of what was later diagnosed as focal dystonia in the right hand forced Fleisher to curtail his playing. As Fleisher sought a variety of remedies, he resumed concertizing with repertoire for left hand. In the early 21st century, Fleisher was able to ameliorate his focal dystonia symptoms after experimental botox injections to the point where he could play with both hands again.

“Can there be a more perfect work for four hands than Schubert’s Fantasia in F Minor? The beauty, logic and lyricism of its four interconnecting movements never fail to move and amaze, particularly when played by pianists of the stature of Leon Fleisher and his wife, Katherine Jacobson. Their reading is quite the equal of Radu Lupu and Murray Perahia’s celebrated 1985 recording.” The Observer