Yojo Christen, Christoph Preiß, Alexander Maria Wagner - piano

Franz Hummel - "2x33" for piano: Diabelli and Hercher Variations

Each CD in this double album presents one work of 33 variations by Franz Hummel.
Initially, Hummel felt challenged by Beethoven‘s Diabelli Variations to compose another 33 variations on the same theme. These were premiered and recorded by Carmen Piazzini in 2007 and re-recorded by Angela Cholakian in 2014.
At a memorial concert in Riedenburg following Hummel‘s death (August 20th 2022), his three master students Yojo Christen, Christoph Preiss and Alexander Maria Wagner performed and reinterpreted these variations so powerfully that the desire arose to record this experience for CD.
The second CD features the Hercher Variations, which Franz Hummel composed between 2017 and 2019, interpreted by Christoph Preiss.
A special feature is that, apart from these two works by Hummel, there are only a few cycles with 30 or more variations in well-known piano literature, e.g. Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations and J.S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations.


FRANZ HUMMEL (1939–2022)
As a child, Franz Hummel was discovered and furthered by Richard Strauss, Eugen Papst and Hans Knappertsbusch. He studied piano and composition in Salzburg and Munich and initially became famous as a virtuoso pianist. In the mid-1970s, Hummel stopped performing as a pianist and dedicated himself exclusively to composing. Since then, his 25 operas, symphonies, concertos, ballets and chamber music, have been performed by internationally renowned musicians and orchestras throughout Europe, eg. “Bluebeard”, a parable about Sigmund Freud, which was performed around 120 times in cities such as Moscow, Paris, London and Rome. In 2000, his widely acclaimed first musical “Ludwig II. – Longing for Paradise” was premiered in the purpose-built Neuschwanstein Musical Theatre. From 2000 till 2003, 1.5 million spectators visited this musical about the Bavarian Fairy Tale King. In 1996, Hummel broke with his abstinence as a pianist to give a concert in the Carnegie Hall in New York.
In 2008, Hummel’s opera “The Judge and His Hangman”, based on Dürrenmatt’s novel, was premiered at the Erfurt Opera House, “Fouché”, a dramatic opera about the French mass murderer, Napoleon’s Minister of Police, was composed for “Linz 09, European Capital of Culture”, and in 2010, “Zarathustra”, a Nietzsche opera, was performed in Regensburg.
Two of Franz Hummel’s live orchestral premieres have been released on CD by TYXart (2012): "HATIKVA – Symphony for Clarinet and Orchestra" – with the soloist Giora Feidman, and "FUKUSHIMA – Symphony for Violin and Orchestra" – in memory of the victims of the Japanese nuclear disaster, with the soloist Elena Denisova. Both recordings feature the Moscow Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Alexei Kornienko.
In 2014, a biography of Franz Hummel was published in the series “Composers in Bavaria” by the Bavarian Musicians’ Association.

Double CD programme / Tracklist: