Beethoven/ Rubinova - Last Rose of Summer

The suite is a crazy blend: it is cerebral and at the same time down-to-earth, archaic and modern at once, regional and universal, melancholy and energetic, harsh and tender, simple and difficult, contemplative and carefree, brilliant and mischievous- an almost entirely forgotten masterpiece. Beethoven's National Airs with Variations, op. 105, is a work where opposites collide. This is the piece on which the rest of this Beethoven programme is centered. Music critics praise Evgenia Rubinova's "polyphonic clarity," her "singing tone and sensual sonorities" (Fono Forum), her "whole hearted musical empathy" (Piano News), her "mastery in terms of musical expression" and her "superior art of balancing extremes" (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung). In 2003 she won the Silver Medal at the renowned Leeds International Pianoforte Competition. Audiences acclaim and critics unanimously praise her strong personality and fruitful imagination, the variety of tone colors and animated counterpoint revealed in her playing, her sense of architectural balance and her command of a work's entire structure.