Search - Franz Schubert, Ludwig van Beethoven, Frédéric Chopin, Anton Rubinstein, Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Camille Saint-Saëns, Claude Debussy, Adolph von Henselt George Gershwin, Frederick Moyer :: Rhapsody In Blue

In this program of familiar classics, ten of the works are preceded by preambules by Adolf von Henselt (1814-1889). A delightful genre that has faded from use during this century, a preambule (often called "prelude"), was a very short piece played before a larger work to prepare the listener for the tonality and mood to follow. These miniatures were improvised or composed to sound improvised. The practice of performing preambules is old, the earliest written examples dating back to the 15th century. Preambules were in vogue among pianists throughout the Classical and Romantic eras. Mozart wrote four of them (Capriccio, K. 395); Moscheles, fifty; Clementi, at least thirty; and Hummel, twenty-four. Among the most beautiful and effective is Henselt's set of twenty-four which covers all the major and minor keys.