BRAHMS & SCHUMANN: Strings Attached - Arno Piters & Members of the Royal Concertgebouw

Sonate opus 120/1 f moll für Klarinette und Streichquintett (1894) Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)
Fantasiestücke opus 73 (1849) für Klarinette und Streichquartett Robert Schumann (1810-1856)
Sonate opus 120/2 Es dur für Klarinette und Streichsextett Johannes Brahms
Arrangements by Geert van Keulen

Nowadays interest in arrangements is on the rise again, not only in historical adaptations, which shed an interesting light on earlier musical performance practice, but also in contemporary variants.
In my arrangements on this CD only the piano music has been adapted, and the clarinet scores are unchanged. Stylistically, I have tried to stay as close to the originals as possible. Except for a few altered chords and solutions for a number of typically pianistic parts, the notes from the originals are unchanged.

As Schumann and Brahms were inspired by the musicians for whom they wrote these works, in working on the score I also had in mind certain musicians whose musical qualities aroused my enthusiasm. While the arrangement of the sonata in F minor was written at the request of clarinettist Hein Wiedijk, my scores of the E flat major sonata and the Fantasiestücke were written at the request of clarinettist Arno Piters: