WALTER REHBERG Polydor recordings 1925 - 1937

APR7309

3CDs

COMPACT DISC 1 (80’17) 
1-2 HAYDN Piano Sonata in G major Hob XVI:40 Recorded 1925  
3-6 SCHUBERT Fantasy in C major ‘Wanderer’ D760 Recorded 1928  
7 SCHUBERT Menuetto from Piano Sonata in G major, D894 Recorded 1928  
8 SCHUBERT Impromptus in G flat & A flat D899/3 & 4 Recorded on 10 July 1937  
10. SCHUBERT Moment musical in F minor D780/3 Recorded 1928  
11 CHOPIN Polonaise-Fantasy in A flat Op 61 Recorded 1933  
12 SCHUMANN Fantasie in C major Op 17 Recorded 1928  
 
COMPACT DISC 2 (79’05) 
1 LISZT/BUSONI Mephisto Waltz No 1 S514 Recorded 1925  
2 LISZT Funérailles S173/7 Recorded 1925;   3 LISZT Consolation No 3 in D flat S172 Recorded 1928  
4 LISZT Rapsodie espagnole S254 Recorded 1928;   5 LISZT Eglogue S160/7 Recorded 1933  
6 LISZT Sonetto 104 del Petrarca S161/5 Recorded 1928   
7 LISZT Les jeux d’eaux à la Villa d’Este S163/4 Recorded on 6 July 1937 
8 LISZT Ave Maria ‘Die Glocken von Rom’ S182 Recorded 1928   
9 LISZT Soirée de Vienne No 6 in A minor S427 Recorded 1931
10 GOUNOD/LISZT Valse de l’opéra ‘Faust’ S407 Recorded 1928  
11 VERDI/LISZT Rigoletto – Paraphrase de Concert S434 Recorded on 6 July 1937
 
COMPACT DISC 3 (77’16) 
1 WEBER Invitation to the Dance Op 65 Recorded on 5 July 1937 
2 BRAHMS Waltzes Op 39/1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 11, 14 & 15 Recorded 1933   
3-4 BRAHMS Rhapsodies in B minor & G minor Op 79/1 & 2 Recorded 1928  
5 GRIEG Wedding Day at Troldhaugen Op 65/6 & To Spring Op 43/6 Recorded 1931  
7 MENDELSSOHN Spring Song Op 62/6 Recorded 1931   
8 SINDING Rustle of Spring Op 32/3 Recorded 1931 
9 RACHMANINOV Prelude in C sharp minor Op 3 No 2 Recorded 1931  
10 STRAUSS/BASS Frühlingsstimmen, Concert Paraphrase Recorded 1931
11 STRAUSS/ALFRED GRÜNFELD Soirée de Vienne Op 56 Recorded 1931 
12 STRAUSS/SCHULZ-EVLER The Beautiful Blue Danube Recorded 1931  
13 REHBERG Tanzstudien in B minor & G from Tanzstudien für Jankó Klavier, Op 3 Recorded 1931

15 REHBERG Fünf Fantasien über ein Thema von Verdi Op 2 Recorded 1931
 

The Swiss pianist, editor and writer, Walter Rehberg (1900–1957) was a mainstay of the German Polydor label in the 1920s & ’30s but his work has never before been transferred to LP or CD, and as a result he has faded from view. He was entrusted with the first ever recordings of such masterworks as the Schubert and Schumann Fantasies, and these and his Liszt playing reveal a true romantic virtuoso who was nevertheless equally at home in the classicism of the Haydn sonata he recorded in early 1925 – another gramophone premiere. Rehberg was a champion of the Jankó piano, an instrument which allowed the easier playing of larger intervals and complex chords. The instrument never caught-on but the pianist’s own compositions for it (disc 3, tracks 13-15) reveal the fascinating sonorities that could be created with it.

APR7309 Available on Compact Disc, as a Digital Download and to Stream