Born in 1973, Richard Ormrod studied firstly with Beate Popperwell, then at Wells Cathedral School with Michael Young and completed his studies at the Moscow Conservatory with Elisso Virsaladze. He presently resides in London and serves on the piano faculties of the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama and Cardiff University.

I can only say I am living a wretched life; for two years I have avoided almost all social gatherings because it is impossible for me to say to people: ‘I am deaf.’ If I belonged to any other profession it would be easier, but in my profession it is an awful state...

Letter, 26th June 1801

In 1800-1801 Beethoven was on the cusp between his early Haydnesque, classical style and the more intensely personal and Romantic music of his middle period. It seems cruelly ironic that it was, in part, the ‘awful state’ of the onset of his deafness, which forced the introspection and gave rise, alternately, to the deep despair and defiance (I will take Fate by the throat, it shall not wholly overcome me.), which were to feed the revolution of these middle years. There are other, (initially, at least) happier passions associated with this period, too. This was the time of his love affair with the ‘immortal beloved’, who Beethoven never named, but seems likely to have been the Countess Giulietta Guicciardi, dedicatee of the more famous second of this pair of opus 27 sonatas, the so-called Moonlight in C-sharp minor.

The E-flat sonata is dedicated to Princess Johanna von Liechtenstein, née the Landgravine Fürstenberg and, like its celebrated sibling, is described by its composer as Sonata Quasi una Fantasia (sonata in the form of a fantasia). It is easy to imagine Beethoven, in the sway of the strong and conflicting emotions described above, searching for a new means of self-expression and to extend ‘classical’ form by combining strict sonata with free fantasy.

The work plays continuously and, as might be expected, is full of contrast. The E-flat Andante of the opening, interrupted by a C major Allegro, continues its leisurely progress as though nothing had happened and leads to the Allegro molto e vivace scherzo. There follows the beautiful, song-like, Adagio con espressione which after a brief cadenza-like passage (and just where we would expect a second subject), surprises us by turning into the Allegro vivace finale. The melody of the Adagio returns, this time in the home key of E-flat, before a Presto coda.

1. Allegretto  2. Scherzo  3. Allegro molto - Sostenuto

Composed in 1916, the Suite Op.14 is one of Bartók’s most important works for piano. It consists of three short movements, arranged in an unusual order, with three fast movements followed by a slow section.

The first movement is in ternary form, the second is a scherzo, the third movement uses material taken from Arabic folkmusic while the final meditative slow section is in 6/8.

Speaking of the Suite Bartók said, "I had in mind the refining of piano technique.... into a more transparent style".

The polonaise originated in the late 16th century as a stately processional dance and many composers, including Weber, enjoyed writing polonaises. In Chopin’s hands the polonaise became very different, a powerful symbol of Poland, an evocation of its past splendor and designed to draw attention to the oppression of the Poles by the Russians. Massive sonorities are conjured from the instrument, dynamic markings of ff and even fff are common, and the mood alternating frequently and dramatically between defiant grandeur and melting lyricism.

Chopin was born in Zelazowa Wola (near Warsaw), on March 1, 1810, and died in Paris on October 17, 1849. The Polonaise in A-flat Major, Op.53 was composed in 1842-43. It is proud, ceremonial and martial music causing it to be given the nickname the "Heroic" Polonaise. In the central section, a melody is heard over a steady rumbling of repeated octaves in the bass. After "this central episode," wrote John Ogdon, " Chopin’s return to the main section is a tour de force: few composers would have dared and achieved so apparently wayward and capricious a return in so grandiose a work."

Beethoven’s Sonata op.106 in B-flat Major, subtitled by the composer Große Sonata für das Hammerklavier is rightly viewed as being one of the composer’s most extraordinary achievements. Beethoven himself wrote that the sonata would keep pianists busy "for fifty years hence" – a delightful expression of faith in progress, since it continues utterly to confound both pianists and audiences a full 180 years after its composition!

The sonata begins with a gigantic sonata-form first movement, which incorporates the fullest possible range - and indeed far exceeds the possible range - of the instrument and compositional form. Themes in wildly differing tonalities are juxtaposed, and even the extended fugato of the development section is quite unable to resolve the contradictions of the material. A menacing coda signifies the unfinished quality of the movement. This is followed by a scherzo of disarmingly humorous nature, though with a disquieting central section. A sarcastic tremolando heralds the return of the scherzo theme, modified this time to include complicated rhythmic interjections.

The slow Adagio is one of the most beautiful creations of Beethoven’s entire oeuvre. The incredibly spacious treatment of the thematic material seems to look far into future, to the late romantics, but the form is always perfectly constructed. Never is the thread lost. Neither, however, are the questions of the first movement answered. For that to happen, a huge fugue is required, one of totally absurd proportions by the standards of the early 19th Century. What an extraordinary effect this movement must have had on contemporary audiences, who were scarcely equipped to listen to music that came so perilously close to the sounds of chaos. Still, order prevails, and after a fugue, a fugue on the inversion of the first fugue, a second fugue in D major, and a double fugue based on the first and second fugues combined, the sonata comes to its triumphal close, rising trills finally reaching the B-flat which began the work.

Richard Ormrod