This is the tracklist (Nos. 1 - 74) for CD1 of the Double CD.
Cover-Art by Manuela Buechler, AI Design, Switzerland.
This doublealbum is the third in the series "Demanding pianomusic for children andf students".
Listen to track 1 first, an introduction to this Part I of the Double Album, spoken by Robert von Heeren.

Béla Bartók was a Hungarian composer, pianist and music ethnologist. In addition to composing, Bartók spent almost his entire life systematically collecting and recording folk songs. He composed his collection "For Children" in 1908/1909 at the beginning of his teaching career as professor for piano at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest. The first edition of this collection published in 1909 contained 85 piano pieces. Shortly before his death he revised this cycle: he made many changes, added metronome and duration information to each piece and removed six pieces whose origin he was not sure of. His “revised edition” from 1945 thus contains 79 compositions for solo piano, divided into two sub-cycles: Volume 1 contains 40 pieces based on Hungarian children and folk songs, Volume 2 contains 39 pieces whose melodies stem from Slovakian folk songs. On this double CD you’ll find these 79 pieces of the revised version and the six removed pieces, which were included in the first edition.

Whether Bartók consciously took up Schumann's idea of his Album for the Young op. 68 with his "For Children"-pieces is not known to me. But I’m sure that he knew Schumann's album. In contrast to Schumann, whose musical material is mainly based on his own ideas, Bartók follows a different, but no less brilliant path: each piece is based on a Hungarian or Slovakian folk song (he had the lyrics appended in the printed score), whose melody he artfully and ingeniously underscores with an accompaniment and develops it into a perfect piano composition. The melody always plays the leading role and keeps its original form. In almost all works it appears at least twice: The first time he presents it with a simple, restrained and more conventional accompaniment, the second time the accompaniment is more elaborate and unconventional in terms of harmony, rhythm and articulation. Particularly fascinating to me is that he then manages to give the melody more depth by using unexpected harmonic twists, while at the same time leading the piece to a worthy and original conclusion - and all this within just a few bars! It is as if Bartók wants to show that there is more to the simplicity than it appears. This sophistication often leads the listener to believe that she/he is hearing something completely new. In fact, only the context in which the melody is embedded has changed, not the melody itself! It is only in the longer, more complex pieces towards the end of the two volumes that he sometimes varies the pitch, rhythm, tempo, articulation or adds additional motives. By the way: In contrast to Schumann there are very few repetition signs. Bartók’s compositional technique always aims at the continuous development. Only in two pieces (Volume 1, No. 21 and Volume 2, No. 13) does he have the whole piece played through twice.

Bartók's pieces for children are a wonderful enrichment of the genre. As different as the musical and compositional styles of Schumann and Bartók's cycles are, there are also some similarities between them: In both cycles, the tension build up from piece to piece and lead the player to wonderfully elaborated compositions at the end of the cycles, which are quasi a "freestyle" and climax. The whole cycle with its 79 pieces poses an enormous learning curve for the piano beginner. Especially the Swineherd Dance (Volume I, No. 40) and the Rhapsody (Volume II, Nos. 36-37, the piece consists of two pieces that Bartók merged into one) form wonderful and difficult highlights and can be considered as little "showpieces".

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Béla Bartók - For Children Sz. 42 (revised edition) - Part I

This is Karganoff's response to Tchaikovky's March of the Wooden Soldiers in the Children's album, op. 39 No. 5 and of the same piece in the Nutcracker's Suite. Tchaikovsky was a great idol for Karganoff.

Génari Karganoff - Youth Album op. 25 & 21, Excerpts from Miniatures & Aquarelles - Part II

Génari - Karganoff - March Of The Leaden Soldiers - Non Troppo Presto - A-major - Op. 20 - No. 1

This is the first piece of Bartók's "For Children" cycle, which he revised in 1945 shortly before his death. In the revised edition he changed/optimized many pieces and took out six of the originally 85 pieces, because he was unsure of their sources. The revised edition contains 79 pieces. 74 of them are on this playlist/album, the rest and the six outtakes on the Part-II playlist/album.

It consists of two Volumes (and four books).
Volume I is titled: "Little piano pieces for Beginners
(without octave tension) based on Hungarian Children- and Folksongs" and has 40 pieces.

Béla Bartók - For Children Sz. 42 rev. edition - Part I

Béla - Bartók - Children at Play - Allegro - C-major - Sz. 42 - No. 1

Béla Bartók - Children at Play - Allegro - C-major - Sz. 42 - No. 1

Béla - Bartók - Children's Song- Andante - C-major - Sz. 42 - No. 2

Béla Bartók - Children's Song- Andante - C-major - Sz. 42 - No. 2

Béla - Bartók - Quasi Adagio - A-minor - Sz. 42 - No. 3

Béla Bartók - Quasi Adagio - A-minor - Sz. 42 - No. 3

Béla - Bartók - Round Dance - Lento - Sz. 42 - E - Minor - No. 17

Béla Bartók - Round Dance - Lento - Sz. 42 - E - Minor - No. 17

This is the final piece of the revised cycle. It has many rubati and tempo changes (all with metronome marks) and some Jazz influence, to teach the student a more improvised and free style of interpretation.

Béla - Bartók - Mourning Song - Lento - C-major - Sz. 42 - No. 79

Béla Bartók - Mourning Song - Lento - C-major - Sz. 42 - No. 79

This is an introduction into Part I of Double Album with beautiful piano music by Béla Bartók and Alfredo Casella, written and spoken by the artist himself, Robert von Heeren.

Béla Bartók - Introduction To Part I by Robert von Heeren (English)

Einführung in Teil 1 des wunderschönen Zyklus "Für Kinder" von Béla Bartók, Klavier solo, von Robert von Heeren

Einführung in Béla Bartóks "Für Kinder", Sz. 42, Teil 1, von Robert von Heeren

This heartfelt call for World Peace is delivered by Welsh vocalist Wendy Jayne Vowden (@Wjv_entertain).  #NewRelease   Now available for download & streaming @RouteNote distribution on all major digital platforms, worldwide.
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LYRICS VIDEO + download / streaming links:  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5BVmo8EMrM/
Boys, now they're soldiers, marching with their guns
And soon, we' ll hear mothers, weeping for their sons.
LORD I beseech thee
Please wrap your arms around the world
And let there be Peace On Earth for Christmas.
Teach us forgiveness
Where there is hatred, bless with love
This is my prayer ....
War has been raging, throughout history
Oh LORD, we need saving, from this insanity
So, I beseech thee
Please wrap your arms around the world
And let there be Peace On Earth for Christmas.
Teach us forgiveness
Where there is hatred, bless with love
This is my prayer .... for Christmas
Nations will throw their swords down
They won't be needed any more
In a world without the curse of war.
People will work together
United, for the common good
Saving lives, instead of shedding blood
LORD I beseech thee
Please wrap your arms around the world
This is my prayer ....
Peace On Earth for Christmas
Everywhere.
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© 2015 Georgina Hilton (Hilton Music UK), all rights reserved.
Contact: Georgina at songs4singers@outlook.com

PEACE ON EARTH FOR CHRISTMAS (MY PRAYER)

'Peace On Earth For Christmas' (My Prayer)

Carrie and I wrote this song years ago. When she died I just felt I had to record it. This is only a demo unmixed, we only had a few hours to record it. But the lyrics she wrote with me I think are marvelous. Carrie and I used to stay up til dawn chatting and pontificating about life. They were my best moments. Anyway... we wrote a song about staying up too late and hearing the birds sing. Willow Smith is a prodigal angel and was generous enough to lend her golden voice to this little tune.

Bird Song

Love comes on cat's feet
It circles the corners
It sits by the window and whispers...
'Mine! Your mine! all mine!'

My arm fell asleep
And dreamt it was your arm
Hush lest we break the spell, oh well, oh well..

It's all so wrong
To greet the dawn
The birds sing that awful song saying 
'You don't belong here!'

Bird Song_R2

This is a reinterpretation of a wonderful soundtrack found in the 1981 television series "Brideshead Revisited" based on the novel of the same name by Evelyn Waugh.  The magnificent soundtrack for the series was composed by the late Geoffrey Burgon.

Brideshead Revisited: A Re-interpretation

Embers

This composition was inspired by a reading of the poem, "The Swan" by Mary Oliver.

The Swan

Did you too see it, drifting, all night, on the black river?
Did you see it in the morning, rising into the silvery air -
An armful of white blossoms,
A perfect commotion of silk and linen as it leaned
into the bondage of its wings; a snowbank, a bank of lilies,
Biting the air with its black beak?
Did you hear it, fluting and whistling
A shrill dark music - like the rain pelting the trees - like a waterfall
Knifing down the black ledges?
And did you see it, finally, just under the clouds -
A white cross Streaming across the sky, its feet
Like black leaves, its wings Like the stretching light of the river?
And did you feel it, in your heart, how it pertained to everything?
And have you too finally figured out what beauty is for?
And have you changed your life?

So Says the Swan

Pianist. musician (guitar, piano, vocal), music teacher (classical guitar & piano), astrology, astronomy, genealogy, scifi, photography, movies, nature, 
I always learn new piano pieces directly from the score.
German imprint/Impressum: http://musik.robertvonheeren.de/impressum.html

Béla Bartók - Round Dance - Lento - Sz. 42 - E - Minor - No. 17

Robert von Heeren

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