Beethoven and Diabelli

In 1819 the Viennese music publisher and would-be composer, Anton Diabelli, challenged Beethoven - and 50 other composers - to write one variation each on a nondescript little waltz melody.

Beethoven never did things in half-measures. Instead of writing only one variation of his publisher’s trite little theme, he wrote 33. The 33 Variations on a Waltz by Anton Diabelli (better known as the Diabelli Variations) has been described as the greatest set of variations ever written, and the famous composer’s most adventurous piano work. They mirror his life, its artistic highs and tempestuous lows. A fiendishly unmanageable set of contrasting moods and colours, they are not for the fainthearted pianist. For the rest of us, they’re a wild ride on a Beethoven-designed emotional big-dipper.

It took Beethoven four years to compose his masterpiece. Soon after finishing them, he complained bitterly to a visiting instrument maker about the inadequacy of his Broadwood piano, broken, it seems, while composing this work. Now, nearly 200 years later, the Stuart & Sons piano allows Gerard Willems to capture the wide spectrum of Beethoven’s moods with a surprisingly fresh, full-bodied sound.

The Diabelli Variations are seldom performed, and rarely recorded - never in Australia by an Australian, until now.