Listen to the Daniel Hope 'tribute podcast' to Alfred Schnittke. It's the violinist's encounter with one of the twentieth century's most original and fascinating composers. This podcast was hosted and produced by Crossover Media's Max Horowitz.
"The real legacy of Schnittke's music is its multidimensional exploration of what musical truth in the twentieth century might be, from chaotic polystylism to heartfelt spirituality." - The Guardian
Schnittke – Works for Violin and Piano, released in February 2021 by Deutsche Grammophon, pairs Hope with pianist Alexey Botvinov in a programme of enormous creative breadth and energy. Botvinov, an acclaimed interpreter of the composer's works, joins Daniel Hope for an album that embraces everything from the immediately accessible Polka and Tango to the multi-layered Violin Sonata No.1, the work that first ignited Hope's passion for Schnittke's music.
Daniel Hope was fifteen when he first encountered the music of Alfred Schnittke in 1989. The experience launched a love affair with the Russian composer's work that has continued to deepen ever since. The violinist's latest album for Deutsche Grammophon pays homage to this maverick genius, whose elegant explorations of past styles and free-thinking experiments in "polystylism" were both original and iconoclastic, at times bringing him into conflict with the Soviet authorities.
