Events

Bach Capriccio in B-flat major BWV 992
Beethoven Piano Sonata no. 26, op. 81a ‘Les Adieux’

Interval

R. Schumann Geistervariationen ‘Ghost Variations’
Prokofiev Piano Sonata no. 7, op. 83 ‘Stalingrad’

‘The maturity and sophistication of her thoughtful interpretations would be the pride of any pianist twice her age.’  Gramophone

Born in Hannover in 1995, Elisabeth Brauß is one of the most exciting musicians of her generation. She performs across Europe and, as a former BBC New Generation Artist, is a frequent visitor to the UK. Her current season includes a return to Wigmore Hall for a solo recital and concerto engagements with Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. It also sees her touring North America with concerts in Montreal and across the USA, ending at the Phillips Collection Museum, Washington DC.

Elisabeth’s performance of Robert Schumann’s Carnaval in the 2024 Piano Series was so popular that she was instantly invited back. This time she plays his ‘Ghost Variations’, a work composed in the period immediately before his admission to the asylum for the insane. Schumann was suffering hallucinations, voices were playing music to him and allowing him, in his own words, ‘magnificent revelations’.

Works with titles are intriguing and Elisabeth gives us two more. ‘Les Adieux’ was Beethoven’s farewell to his patron Archduke Rudolph, when he was forced to leave Vienna as Napoleon’s army took the city. ‘Stalingrad,’ one of Prokofiev’s three War Sonatas, is hard to pin down. It contains some of Prokofiev’s most dissonant and brutal writing but also some of his warmest. The contrast is a perpetually interesting one.

.

from Bachtrack – Rising Stars: ten to watch in 2024-25
‘Following a spell as a BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist, German pianist Elisabeth Brauß is making a name for herself in the UK. Stylistically assured, her playing bristles with vitality. I recall a terrific Prokofiev Second Piano Sonata at Wigmore Hall…..’

Elisabeth performs Mozart’s Piano Sonata in A minor, Wigmore Hall, January 2022.