“Hearing these two gifted musicians working together with such pleasure and mutual understanding was like seeing two people collaborate on a challenging crossword puzzle, at high speed—fascinating in the moment, and, once the mind caught up to what they were doing, uncanny and dazzling.”
Haimovitz and pianist Christopher O’Riley play the living daylights out of these works. They lap up Beethoven’s combative style like hungry lions anticipating raw steak, relishing the composer’s frequentsubito dynamics, unpredictable placement of accents and over-the-bar-line phrase groupings
4.5/5 Stars Cellist Matt Haimovitz and pianist Christopher O’Riley released their first album together in 2011, an eclectic program of clever crossover arrangements titled Shuffle.Play.Listen. Haimovitz is well-known for bringing […]
March 9, 2015 Acclaimed cellist and pianist duo perform from their new album of carefully recreated classics: “Beethoven, Period”. Listen here: CBC Radio
February 22, 2015 NEW RELEASE OF THE WEEK Beethoven, Period. Pentatone PTC 5186 475 Beethoven: Cello Sonata No 3 in A major, Op 69 (26:11) Matt Haimovitz, cello; Christopher O’Riley, […]
This will be delightfully fascinating for all who know the music. It gives us a different sort of lyric appreciation of the music, a new life born of a return to the period sound.
“There’s a whole world of color and articulation available when you’re not having to worry 80 percent of the time whether you’ll be heard or not,” he says of the period instruments’ superior blend. “If I had known 30 years ago what I know now, I wouldn’t have had to deal with the fact that the modern Steinway’s bass, as much as I love it, is at complete odds with a lot of Beethoven’s music. On the fortepiano, the bass is still penetrating, but the upper, lyric registers are much more singing.”
Oxingale Records 