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Reger: Bach Variations, Op. 81; Traume am Kamin on CD

A new recording of two major Reger cycles,

by a fast-emerging British piano talent.

'To fathom his all-powerful might, no human

may accomplish' - this is the text, from a

duet in Bach's Cantata BWV128, which Reger

takes as the subject of his Bach Variations,

and it may fairly be advanced that Reger

accorded Bach a comparably divine status.

At the age of just 31, Reger had by this stage

assimilated not only Bachian counterpoint

but it's transformation through the ears and

imaginations of Schumann and Brahms and

others, and he proceeds to treat the theme

with astonishing freedom, testing the

technique of the performer while reaching

for the limits of the theme's musical

possibilities over the course of 14 variations.

The cycle concludes with a mighty fugue - or

fugues, on separate subjects (of Reger's own

devising, eventually welded with the Bach

theme). In his booklet essay, Eden Walker

remarks that the final bars are 'some of the

most colossal and victorious of any in the

entire piano repertoire.'

By contrast, as a salutary demonstration of

Reger's versatility, the Traume am Kamin

present him at his most relaxed and

intimate, and anyone who has found it hard

to warm to Reger will surely find in this cycle

a delightful entry-point to an often

forbidding catalogue. 'Dreams by the

Fireside' - Reger's knotty chromatic

harmony still underpins the progress of

these Romantic sketches, but now disguised

by a touch of the 'lateness' that comes over

many artists towards the end of their lives

or careers, whether or not they were aware

of it. This cycle was Reger's final piano cycle

before his death in 1916, aged 41, and the

mood of the cycle is perhaps also marked by

a necessary escapism from the violent

bloodshed around him.

Born in 1995, Eden Walker has become a

specialist in the ultra-virtuoso end of

Romantic piano writing at the hands of

composers such as Alkan, Busoni and

Godowsky (and Reger). Based in Hamburg,

he now teaches at the Staatliche

Jugendmusikschule, as well as furthering his

own studies and giving concerts across

Germany and the UK.