1 - Impromptu; 5 - Ländler
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Dohnányi (1877-1960) was one of the most important Hungarian musicians of the inter-war years (although he was born in what is now Slovakia), and lived in Budapest for most of World War 2. At the end of the War (in which he lost both of his sons) he was forced to flee the oncoming Russians (who would potentially have branded him a Nazi sympathiser), and made his way to the Upper Austrian village of Neukirchen-am-Walde which was in the American zone. He settled there and played the organ of the village church (shown in the titles on the video) in exchange for food for himself and his wife. It was in Neukirchen that he wrote the Op. 41 set in 1945 It is difficult to play these pieces without imagining the sense of loss that Dohnányi must have felt, both of family and heritage, and to me they seem to parallel Strauss's 'Metamorphosen' in their nostalgia for what had been destroyed. The Ländler is the lightest piece in the set, and I would commend to anyone looking for a test piece for a sight-reading contest as it is full of devilish and unpredictable harmonic twists and turns.

Apart from the ubiquitous 'Vier Rhapsodien' a lot of Dohnányi's piano music is underplayed, and I hope that the 50th anniversary of his death in 2010 will lead to the recent revival of his work in the recording studio being backed up by more live recital performances. In particular, it would be good to see his Six Concert Etudes, op. 28 prescribed as set pieces in piano competitions alongside the usual Chopin and Liszt studies.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------- Played by Phillip Sear
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