# Composers as Performers



## Musician (Jul 25, 2013)

Lets not forget that many great composers were also great performers. I have listened to many interpretations of this Mendelssohn Spinning Song from his Songs without Words collection, and by far Rachmaninov's rendering of this piece is nothing short of magnificent.


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## Musician (Jul 25, 2013)

Here's another awesome performance, he was really a great interpreter of music.

Best version:


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

I've been listening to Brett Dean play his Viola Conceto, now THAT is awesome. Incredible composer and a long time member of the Berlin Phil. Here are excerpts of his Viola Concerto:


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Joseph Fennimore is a very fine composer who happens to be an "awesome" painist
Here he is in his delightful Concerto Piccolo for piano and chamber orchestra





Bartok was a renowned interpreter of Beethoven, and his career as recital pianist is a good deal of what kept him afloat.

Frederic Rzewski has the near awed respect of about any pianist who knows what is what about playing the piano. An immense power yet always with the fullest depth of tone, and a remarkable degree of virtuosity.
Here is Rzewski performing his "The People United Will Never Be Defeated" a large-scale set of variations modeled after Beethoven's Diabelli Variations. (The link is 1 of 5)





Composer Charles Wuorinen (Pulitzer prize-winning composer) certainly knows his way around a piano.

Benjamin Britten was one hell of a pianist, as well as one fine conductor.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Just a few of the composers we have recordings of

Rachmaninov was a brilliant pianist as were Bartok and Prokofiev.

Britten was also a gifted pianist and conductor.

Andre Previn could do everything - classical, jazz, movies, musicals, the lot! He also composes.


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