Hanna Plays Beethoven
Orchestral Excerpt Insights • 01-Mar-2021
For CSO Principal Bass Alexander Hanna, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 is one of the most important pieces in the history of music, and the recitativo from the work’s fourth movement presents an opportunity to convey profound emotions on the bass. “There's a real feeling of optimism,” Hanna said. “The hierarchy of the music-making needs to be, at the very, very top. What feeling do we want to evoke in our listeners? Whether you're playing that in an audition or in performance, that is your mission — to evoke that feeling.”
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