Rachmaninov festival - Duo²

Japanese pianist Kanako Ninomiya and Serbian pianist Sara Vujadinović met in Brussels, where they founded their own piano duo in 2016. In this concert, in addition to two early works by Rachmaninov, they will perform music by two contemporaries and compatriots: Stravinsky and Skrjabin.

Rachmaninov composed his Russian Rhapsody at the age of 18 while still studying at the Moscow Conservatory. Two years later, he wrote the Suite No 1 for 2 Pianos. This work in four movements, dedicated to Tchaikovsky, is based on poems by Mikhail Lermontov (movement 1: Barcarolle), Lord Byron (movement 2: La nuit ... L'amour ...), Fyodor Tyutchev (movement 3: Les larmes) and Aleksey Khomyakov (movement 4: Pâques), respectively. In the last movement, sound imitations of the bells Rachmaninov had heard ringing during his early childhood in Novgorod are mixed with excerpts from Russian Orthodox chants thematising the resurrection of Christ.

Where Rachmaninov continued to work in the Romantic tradition, the nine years younger Stravinsky explored new territories. In collaboration with the impresario Sergei Diaghilev, he wrote a series of ballets at the beginning of the 20th century that rocked the music world. Petrushka was Stravinsky's second major ballet after L'oiseau de feu and before Le sacre du printemps. Three mysteriously brought to life puppets (Petrushka herself, the Ballerina and the Moor) become embroiled in a passionate love battle in this ballet in which Petrushka eventually loses out. Duo² also plays the Fantasy in la minor by Russian-symbolist composer Aleksandr Skrjabin, one year older than Rachmaninov.

Duo², ensemble
Kanako Ninomiya, piano
Sara Vujadinovic, piano