This album was recorded live at the soundsofmusic festival in Groningen (NL).

Being a musician, I mostly communicate with the world through music and performance, which is why the decision to play this cycle by Frederic Rzewski was immediate and self-evident. The emotional and technical richness of the piece allows me to express pretty much everything I felt and continue to feel about the events in Belarus in 2020 and today. The immense variety and sometimes sudden changes of musical styles, the complex and versatile emotional world of the cycle calls for a straight connection with our human nature and mirrors the struggles we all go through during our lifetime. All of this makes this music accessible to any ear and even bewitches the unexperienced listener. Remaining complex, but also unexpectedly simple at times, Rzewski’s music reaches his goal to be understood by everyone, speaking directly to our hearts.

This recording is dedicated to all people all over the world, who are fighting for their fundamental rights: people who stand up and protest against dictatorship and injustice, against violence and abuse of power.

Hanna Shybayeva

The People United Will Never Be Defeated!

In 1975, Frederic Rzewski wrote what turned out to be his most successful piece:The People United Will Never Be Defeated!, a piano solo of just over an hour that included all music the composer could imagine and had internalized. It is a grand

stylistic synthesis; postmodernism avant la lettre.

The main framework of the piece is formed by Chilean composer Sergio Ortega’s song ¡El pueblo unido jamás será vencido!, one of the many songs that emerged from the Unidad Popular coalition in Chile between 1969 and 1973, prior to the overthrow of Salvador Allende’s government. Rzewski composed the variations in 1975 as a tribute to the struggle of the Chilean people against the newly imposed repressive regime of Augusto Pinochet. The work also contains allusions to other left-wing struggles from the same and immediately preceding period, such as quotations from the Italian traditional socialist song Bandiera Rossa and the Solidarity Song by Bertolt Brecht and Hans Eisler.

The 36 variations in The People United Will Never Be Defeated! are mostly short and building up to powerful climaxes. In groups of six, they follow the 36 bars of the melody in Ortega’s song. These variations unfold from brash romanticism to pointillist post-Webern explosions, jazzy reflections, pompous marches, modal reflections, and increasingly intensive allusions to the theme. Not only are all sorts of genres covered, but the expressiveness of the variations vary enormously as well: from anxious to exuberant, from introverted to extraverted, from sad to festive. The pianist does not only need virtuoso technique; they need to whistle, close the piano lid, and harmonically receive the reverberations of forceful strokes on the keys. Like in Johann Sebastian Bach’s Goldberg Variations, the final variation is a direct reformulation of the original theme, intended to be heard with new meaning after a long journey through all the previous variations. After this last revival of the theme, Rzewski himself always improvised a long, dazzling cadence.

Frederic Rzewski

1 Thema. With determination 1:38

2 Var. 1. Weaving, delicate but firm 1:02

3 Var. 2. With firmness 0:58

4 Var. 3. Slightly slower, with expressive nuances 1:24

5 Var. 4. Marcato 1:08

6 Var. 5. Dreamlike, frozen 1:12

7 Var. 6. Same tempo as beginning 1:18

8 Var. 7. Tempo, lightly impatiently 1:07

9 Var. 8. With agility, not too much pedal, crisp 1:27

10 Var. 9. Evenly 1:43

11 Var. 10. Comodo, recklessly 1:06

12 Var. 11. Tempo I 0:45

13 Var. 12 1:18

14 Var. 13 2:03

15 Var. 14. A bit faster, optimistically 1:33

16 Var. 15. Flexible, like an improvisation 1:39

17 Var. 16. Same tempo as preceding, with fluctuations, much pedal 1:56

18 Var. 17 1:18

19 Var. 18 1:36

20 Var. 19. With energy 0:46

21 Var. 20. Crisp, precise 0:45

22 Var. 21. Relentless, uncompromising 1:01

23 Var. 22 0:56

24 Var. 23. As fast as possible, with some rubato 0:33

25 Var. 24 2:42

26 Var. 25. With fluctuations 2:08

27 Var. 26. In a militant manner 1:18

28 Var. 27. Tenderly, and with a hopeful expression 5:50

29 Var. 28 1:36

30 Var. 29 0:34

31 Var. 30 2:47

32 Var. 31 1:02

33 Var. 32 1:01

34 Var. 33 1:31

35 Var. 34 1:16

36 Var. 35 1:15

37 Var. 36. Cadenza 5:25

38 Thema. Tempo I 3:24