This item is not eligible for Amazon Prime, but millions of other items are. Join
Amazon Prime today. Already a member?
Sign in.
Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
Bach wrote his Goldberg Variations to help a royal insomniac pass sleepless nights; Beethoven wrote his 32 Diabelli Variations in response to a request for one single variation on a trite little theme. Yet these composite works are among the greatest in the keyboard canon: yoking them together, courtesy of the German tradition's most eminent exponent, virtually guarantees a sensational double CD. And Barenboim doesn't disappoint, even if the audience for his Goldbergs (Where? When? Why aren't we told?) is full of coughers and sneezers. You'd almost think he was doing a special benefit night for the sick. He turns the Bach into a vehicle for some glorious pianism: the opening theme seems live and lithe under his fingers, as though full of energy awaiting its release. Barenboim brings a springy touch to the dance movements, and a meltingly plangent one to the great adagio; in the canons and fugues each voice rings out clearly. Beethoven's majestic variations--moments of pathos, of comedy, and of sheer unhingedness--are bound together by a powerful underlying momentum, until the final variation comes like a benign call from the skies. --Michael Church
See all 26 tracks on this disc
