Walter Riemer and his fortepiano
Ideas
... on using a Mozart-type fortepiano for Bach, Scarlatti and other early keyboard music
Reconstruction
... of Johann Sebastian Bach's method of tuning his keyboard instruments.
Recitals solo and piano duo, repertoire
You can find a list of Solo and duo recitals of Walter Riemer with his fortepiano here! This also gives an overview of his repertoire.
CD recordings
Walter Riemer caused some sensation in expert circles with his CD recordings; particularly with the two first ones, "The Art of the Fugue" and "Goldberg Variations" which had never before been recorded using a fortepiano.
Art of the Fugue and Goldberg
Here you can read more on Walter Riemer's most important and internationally renowned CDs
Photos
... of Walter Riemer and his instrument (after Andreas Stein, 1777).
This is the website of Walter Riemer, the pianist, integrated in the Niederfellabrunn website.
Walter Riemer, born 1940 in Vienna, Austria, studied Piano at the Conservatory Vienna (including one year at Eastman School of Music) as well as electrical engineering at the Technical University Vienna. Besides making a living with electrical engineering he kept playing numerous recitals, mostly chamber music, but also Lied and solo (on the modern piano). He turned his interest to the fortepiano in 1994, already familiar with the Clavichord.
Since 1988 he has been organizing chamber music recitals at Niederfellabrunn Castle, not far from Vienna, Austria.
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In the course of this he met Richard Fuller, American specialist for fortepiano playing, who roused his interest in this field. This led to a few years of playing recitals together on two fortepianos. His present repertoire as a solo fortepianist is here. |
The photo shows their first performance (1995) of the "Art of the Fugue" in Imbach Monastery Church, Lower Austria.
His fortepiano was built from a kit by Zuckermann in 1995 (after an instrument by Andreas Stein, 1773, now in the Collection of historical musical instruments, Leipzig, Germany).
Meanwhile Walter Riemer is also back to the modern piano, mainly in Lied accompaniment.
Shortly after having recorded the "Art of the Fugue", Walter Riemer happened to find a paper published in spring 2005 covering a reconstruction of Johann Sebastian Bach's method of tuning his instruments. Riemer uses no other method for his fortepiano any more and applies it even for the modern piano, occasionally.
Listen to J.S. Bach, The Art of the Fugue, Contrapunctus 12 rectus: