Elisabeth Leonskaja | piano 

This great lady of the piano was the musical partner of Sviatoslav Richter, who recognised her as his alter ego by the intensity of her playing and her close familiarity with the piano repertoire which she conveys to her audiences to universal acclaim . After several evenings in the congenial company of the Streichquartett der Staaskapelle Berlin, she returns as a solo performer for a new journey to different climes. She will open with Mozart’s Sonata K. 576. We know from Mozart’s correspondance that he decided in the summer of 1789 to compose six easy new piano sonatas for Princess Friederike of Prussia. Sonata in D major K. 576 was the only one to see the light of day and it is anything but easy. On the contrary, it requires extraordinary dexterity and could possibly be Mozart’s most technically difficult sonata. This will be followed by two pieces by Schoenberg and Berg, punctuated by two Nocturnes and a Polonaise-Fantaisie by Chopin. These six miniatures for piano, which are only five minutes long, are contemporaneous with Berg’s Sonata No.1 and reveal a pared-back style in response to the grand instrumental form developed in the Symphonic Studies by Schumann in Opus 13, which are some of the most popular solo piano works, perfectly illustrating "studies in the form of variations”. 

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