2018 Events Archive Table |
| APRIL |
| ""The Last Thunderstorm" for Solo Piano Published"~London |
| JANUARY |
| "Happy New Year!" |
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APRIL 2018
The Last Thunderstorm
by Carol Worthey
Composed in Honor of Beethoven's 250
th
Birthday as part of
250 Piano Pieces for Beethoven
Curated by Concert Pianist Susanne Kessel
Carol Worthey
was singularly honored to be chosen along with 249 other
living composers from around the world to compose an
original solo-piano piece in honor of Ludvig Van Beethoven's
250
th
anniversary of his birth, to be celebrated in 2020
throughout the entire world.
Susanne Kessel
, the originator of this unique musical tribute, has worked
tirelessly for years to select, organize and premiere all
250 special works in many concerts in Bonn, Germany, famous
as Beethoven's birthplace.
What a treasure these contemporary works create: The sheer
variety of musical styles and moods chosen by these
international composers makes for a kaleidoscope of highly
individual takes on Beethoven's work and life. Carol is
indeed deeply honored to be part of this grand endeavor.
Publisher
Nikolas Sideris
is to be commended for proofreading and perfecting the
printed scores in all ten volumes of
250 Piano Pieces for Beethoven.
Carol's piece is to be found in Volume 5 of the series;
all ten volumes are available for purchase through Editions
Musica Ferrum. (There ended up being 260 new works, but the
overall title of the project remains the same.)
As soon as she was asked to participate in this global
undertaking, Carol set about researching the composer's life
and works in book after book: Beethoven's difficult
childhood with a drunken and abusive father, his historic
meeting when he was a child to play for Mozart, his awkward
subservience and oftentimes clashes with patrons, his
increasing renown and public adoration, his intense
loneliness and infamous irritability (notwithstanding his
kind heart), his unique path as a freelance composer and
performer giving some of the first open-to-the-broad-public
concerts, his mastery of improvisation ironically coupled
with his insistence that interpreters follow his scores to
the letter, his cleansing walks in the forests and fields,
his controversial or adored creation of never-before modes
of expression, the intensity of his failed loves (surrounded
to this day by speculation about his Immortal Beloved), his
increasing trials coping with the frustration of ongoing
deafness, his scrawling notebooks perfecting every note, his
battle to nurture an uncaring nephew from the grasp of a
dictatorial mother, his allegiances and defiance amidst the
political storms and warring philosophies of his times
— all infused with Beethoven's absolute mission to
lift mankind somehow to new heights. Beethoven is a city of
contradictions.
In the end, the real Beethoven remains — for all his
huge compendium of works, letters and impact on others
— a mystery.
After immersing herself in Beethoven's life and legend,
Carol's attention centered on a very dramatic scene
substantiated by accounts from witnesses: Beethoven's final
hours during a thunderstorm that shook Vienna. She imagined
the forceful composer on his deathbed, getting weaker and
weaker yet somehow raising his fist against the thunder.
Was the Master actually creating the thunderstorm in his
protest against leaving the earth and not completing all his
work?
This scene is depicted in Carol's contribution to the 250
Piano Pieces for Beethoven, The Last Thunderstorm. In this
work Carol depicts the rolling thunder with the lowest notes
in the piano while darts of ascending passages strike like
lightning bolts. The Master's heartbeat infuses the
hesitating dotted rhythm, louds and softs and the echoing
shadows of pedaled tones portray the dying man's struggle
for breath and life. A simple childhood tune emerges as if
the composer were reliving some memories of his youth when
life was simpler and more innocent. In the last whimpers of
this piece Beethoven breathes his last but — like all
those rare geniuses who have bejewelled us with their art
— his music will never die!
Here is Carol Worthey's artcover, titled
A Fist Against The Storm.
It is notable that while Carol was composing the music and
creating the art, she herself was fighting lack of sleep
because of intense joint pain. Completing
The Last Thunderstorm
was her personal triumph as well as a tribute to the
Master.
In late Fall of 2018 Pianist
Susanne Kessler
recorded The Last Thunderstorm and sent Carol Worthey a
personal archival recording of her private studio
performance. Susanne's emotionally powerful and very
beautiful interpretation of the piece on a gorgeous resonant
instrument left the composer in tears — this
consummate pianist seemed to recreate Beethoven's last
moments just as the composer had envisioned them, almost
like a musical eye-witness — a breathtaking recording
indeed!
