The War of the Romantics

Featuring

Jan Michiels
Franz Liszt
Robert Schumann
Johannes Brahms
Arnold Schoenberg

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Performer Biography

Jan Michiels, the pianist on this album, is a professor of piano at the Koninklijk Conservatorium Brussel and has performed as a soloist and chamber musician across Europe and Asia.

Composer's Artistic Vision

The progressive 'New German School,' led by Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner, adopted the motto 'New wine requires new bottles,' seeing Beethoven as inspiration for a fundamentally new kind of music.

Composer's Artistic Vision

Conservative figures like Clara Schumann and Johannes Brahms championed classical forms of 'absolute' music, dismissing 'programme music' (music inspired by non-musical sources) as 'non-music'.

Historical Context

This album explores the "War of the Romantics," a bitter conflict in the mid-19th century between conservative and progressive composers regarding Beethoven's legacy and the future of music.

Compositional Technique

Arnold Schönberg's Chamber Symphony No. 1, Op. 9, created a bridge between Beethoven's traditional work and a more experimental approach, aiming for a close relationship between melody and harmony and emancipating dissonances.

Instruments

The album features three different historical pianos: an 1860 Bechstein for Liszt, an 1870 Streicher for Schumann and Brahms, and an 1899 Bechstein for Schoenberg.