NEW RELEASES

Leif Ove Andsnes embarks on a major project which marks a new departure for the internationally acclaimed pianist and exclusive EMI Classics artist. Together with South African-born visual artist Robin Rhode, they have created a special programme entitled Pictures Reframed which centres around Mussorgsky’s epic piano cycle Pictures at an Exhibition combining music, video and still imagery.

EMI Classics released the project on both DVD and CD in November 2009 and the premiere took place at New York’s Lincoln Center, followed by live performances in the United States and throughout Europe during November and December.

Taking inspiration from Mussorgsky’s work, Rhode created the digital animation Promenade in 2008, which shaped his vision for the project. A variant of this original animation is one of the visual sequences for Pictures Reframed. With its characterful and constantly changing interplay between actor and drawing it fittingly sets the scene for the musical narrative.

In addition to Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition the concert performances will include Schumann’s Kinderszenen and a new commission by Austrian composer Thomas Larcher, with whom Andsnes and Rhode have both worked in the past.

EMI Classics will release a special luxury collector’s edition of Pictures Reframed, including both a DVD and CD packaged together in an exhibition catalogue-style hardback book with a wide selection of images from the creation and final performance version of Pictures Reframed. In addition EMI will release a standard CD of a studio recording of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition and other solo piano works by Mussorgsky, coupled with Schumann’s Kinderszenen.