new release

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Sonatas&Interludes for prepared piano, new release by Neuma Records

It is a great satisfaction to be able to announce this new Spring release (street date: March 17th, 2023), coming out after many years of performances of such a masterpiece as Sonatas and Interludes for prepared piano by John Cage.
This achievement was possible thanks to a great team of professionals: Marco Melchior, always by my side recording, Erdem Helvacioglu, mastering, and Philip Blackburn, director and manager of Neuma Records label. 

To have a physical copy come listen to one of my concerts or buy it on Bandcamp or on Neuma Records website (also digital download).

Happy Spring to you all!

Best Bandcamp Contemporary Classical – March 2023

COMPLETE REVIEWS and RADIO here (last update April 6th 2023):

…a fresh look into the seven decades old music that both her playing and her musicological insights make as fresh as if the work had been composed last year.
Rafael de Acha, All about the Arts , February 27th, 2023

The prepared piano was one of the legacies of composer John Cage, and this album with Agnese Toniutti gives a tribute to the iconoclastic sound and attitude. Is the listener prepared for the prepared piano?
George W.Harris, Jazz Weekly, February 27th, 2023
 
The sound of the work has something special, different from many other editions of this repertoire… we have reason to believe that Cage would have appreciated this magical playful “humus.” Needless to note Toniutti’s executive gracefulness, which blends with that precision of accent inescapable in the most “antipianistic” pianism of the 20th century, devoid of emphasis, restored to a welcoming, almost meditative dimension.
Marco Maria Tosolini, Il Gazzettino, March 8th, 2023
 
Agnese Toniutti, among the greatest “performers” of contemporary classical music, interprets to perfection this summa of modern culture… And the pianist, in approaching the instrument, opts for the wonder of intonation and the delicacy of timbre.
Guido Michelone, Alias – Il Manifesto, March 18th, 2023
 
Certainly there’s much to admire in the Italian pianist Agnese Toniutti’s centered rhythm, rich palette of dynamic nuances, and her sensitive textural delineation…Toniutti unquestionably conveys the music’s roots in dance, as well as Cage’s subtle humor. Her intelligent, well-written booklet notes discuss both the music and the process of getting it ready for performance.
Jed Distler, Classics Today.com, April 3rd, 2023
 
This is a very enjoyable recording whether it is to be a collector’s only recording of this music or one that stands most favorably in comparison to previous recordings. If this is to be your first recording of this work or if you simply want to hear another interpretation, you will not be disappointed. This is a wonderful performance. […] Keep your eyes and ears open for Agnese Toniutti, an advocate for and a master of the avant garde.
Allan J.Cronin, New Music Buff, April 14th, 2023
 
…That is why this interpretation by Toniutti is sensational. We are listening to a Martian instrument; the technologization of the old piano is extreme and detected. Then there is the anti-solemn attitude of this performer who manages to bring to mind the amiability of Cage in the midst of games (also paradoxically evocative of the Baroque) that seem to take place among laboratory machines and not in front of the most matronly and bourgeois of keyboard instruments.
Mario Gamba, Alias – Il Manifesto, April 22nd, 2023

 

  • From the booklet of Sonatas&Interludes, Neuma Records



250-Cardini

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Giancarlo Cardini: Lento trascolorare, piano music available on line and in store

Despite we’re definitely living in “interesting times”, as Venice Biennale 2019 seemed to foresee, music finds its way.
My new recording Giancarlo Cardini: Lento trascolorare, piano music is finally available on line at Da Vinci Classics website, and from June, 12th on digital distribution (iTunes, Amazon, etc) and in store. 
On the playlist four unreleased pieces, “Via del Fico, Firenze. Una piccola strada disadorna, silenziosa, quasi immota, arida e bella” (2011), “Tre momenti di sessualità infantile” (2007), “Terza Fantasia, ad Agnese Toniutti” (2018) and a new version of “Foglie d’autunno lentamente trascolorano” (1983, rev. 2018), together with the fascinating “Rituals for the Ryoanji Garden” for piano, gong and voice (2012) and “Una notte d’inverno” (1982) (preview here and below).
The booklet offers a writing by Giancarlo Cardini himself about his music. On the cover a picture by Enzo Della Monica taken during one of Cardini’s performances in the 80ies, part of the artist book Bolle di sapone/Soap bubbles (G. Cardini – Bolle di sapone, Centro Di, Firenze 1991). Inside some shots by the photographer Alberto Moretti.
The piano is a Steinway & Sons B-211 dated 1890, restored by Steinway Academy technician Lorenzo Cerneaz, with a magnificent sound, rich in resonance.
It’s a joy to finally see the first public (virtual but real) appearance of a project about music that I love. Let’s hope these sounds will have a long life, generous as they are in peaceful colours!

“…  there is a (contemplative) process absorbed with the rational calmness of those who practice the voluptuousness of critical thinking. […] And Toniutti is really good at returning these impressions and sensations.”
Mario Gamba, Alias – Il Manifesto, 16/5/2020

“Beyond time and space. […] spirals of enchanting repetitions that run alongside the silence, of expressive modesty in peace with the world. These Zen meditations progress lightly away from the care of the present, with a placid, ceremonial step, even without ever really advancing towards a specific goal. […] the album is in all respects (Cardini’s) portrait, light, intimate […]”
Gregorio Moppi, la Repubblica, 15/6/2020

Interview with Paolo Cantarutti, Radio Onde Furlane (Italian/Furlan): Lento trascolorare cun Agnese Toniutti
“A very beautiful CD, with music made up of consonances and soft dissonances that fade into each other, just like the title, and above all with a beautiful sound, with this old Steinway piano from 1890 with its so particular harmonics.”

“Giancarlo Cardini, the unrepeatable moment  – 
Pianist Agnese Toniutti in Lento Trascolorare reads with extraordinary depht piano compositions by the Tuscan composer”.
Review and interview by Paolo Carradori , il Giornale della Musica, 2/7/2020, (article in italian)

“… pages […] that the virtuoso pianist Agnese Toniutti expresses enphasizing the lyrical constructivist scattered between note and note.”
Guido Michelone, Alias – il Manifesto, 11/07/2020

“Giancarlo Cardini/Agnese Toniutti, Lento trascolorare piano music
Cardini entrusted to play some of his composition pianist Agnese Toniutti, who gave evidence of extraordinary accuracy and depht, capable as few others to recognize and enhance the implications and nuances of Cardini’s thought.”
Enzo Boddi, Musica Jazz, 12/07/2020 (italian)

“For Cardini’s 80th birthday, a critical contribution and a review of Agnese Toniutti’s cd
[…] Toniutti is good at grasping the very slow transfigurations, the subtle nuances, highlighting mottled dissonances or sweet consonances, the evocation of nature, the sense of mystery, the rituality of the gesture, returning us in a ‘cardinian sound’, possible only if the the interpreter adheres with participation to a completely personal and vaguely arcane (musical) world like that of Cardini’s music. An excellent example of how it should work.”
Renzo Cresti, www.renzocresti.com, 25/07/2020

“[…] it’s up to the interpreter – the talented pianist Agnese Toniutti – to bring out the most minute details and the most hidden expressive nuances, jealously guarded, but still eager to be shared with the listener.”
Filippo Focosi, Kathodik, 15/10/2020

Interview with Luisa Antoni, Radio Capodistria – Sonoramente classici, 26/7/2020 (podcast): Agnese Toniutti e Giancarlo Cardini

Interview with Marco Maria Tosolini, RAI Radio Uno – Il concerto che vorrei 5/9/2020 (podcast): Playing with…il gioco nella musica
“I recommend this cd […] whose songs induce a state of profound pacification“

Interview with Luca Berni, Rete Toscana Classica – Cronache musicali 9/9/2020 (podcast): Nuovi Album di Agnese Toniutti e Alberto Bocini
“A valuable publication […] the listener is engaged in a sort of walking journey within the music. In this moment we may need a music that is so rarefied but very present and very alive, which speaks to us of today, of our time. It is a very special record, let me tell you, it is a record that requires work from the listener, which requires attention.”

RAI Radio Tre – Battiti 24/9/2020 (podcast): Lento trascolorare

 


Panorama Cardini

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Giancarlo Cardini’s recording coming soon

Beginning of Autumn dedicated to the music of Giancarlo Cardini, working with the composer himself and recording in studio on a marvellous resounding Steinway B dated 1860, restored by Cerneaz Pianoforti – Official Steinway Dealer. The recording, including three unedited pieces, will be released at the beginning of 2020. Below, the inspiringly silent view from Cardini’s studio, in the Tuscan countryside, and some pics from the recording session (thanks to Luca Piovesan, sound engineer and… photographer.)

The view (and silence) of Tuscan countryside from Cardini’s studio

Playing the marvellous Steinway B dated 1860, restored by Cerneaz Pianoforti…

…and the impressive gong by AltrOnde/Stefano Dalan. Plenty of beautiful sounds!