Gneixendorf Music – A Winter Journey
Gneixendorf Music – A Winter Journey is a piano concerto by Brett Dean from 2019 to be performed in both an upright piano with the half-blow pedal activated and a grand piano. As his previous compositions "Pastoral Symphony" and "Testament", it is inspired in Ludwig van Beethoven, specifically in his stay in a farmhouse in Gneixendorf late in his life, where he revised his Symphony No. 9 and completed his String Quartet No. 16.

The work was commissioned by Jonathan Biss and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra as the final installment in a project for five new compositions for piano and orchestra to be coupled along with Beethoven's five piano concertos, and premiered by Biss and the Swedish Radio Symphony under David Afkham in the Berwaldhallen on February 13, 2020 next to Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5. Beethoven's concerto is quoted in the work, and the orchestration is the same except for the addition of a percussionist and an alto flute. The three movements' titles quote remarks by Beethoven:

# "That sounds like a breaking axle" – after his reaction after first hearing about Gneixendorf.
# "Difficult decisions. Must it be?" – after annotations in his String Quartet No. 16's final movement.
# "Applause my friends, the comedy is over" – after his alleged last utterance in his deathbed.

The muffled upright piano is used in the first movement, in order to depict Beethoven's aural isolation caused by his deafness at the time.
Q1746028
piano concerto
MEDIA
Q382700
Brett Dean
PER
None
Pastoral Symphony
UNK
None
Testament
UNK
Q255
Ludwig van Beethoven
PER
Q5574207
Gneixendorf
LOC
Q11989
Symphony No. 9
MEDIA
Q194924
String Quartet No. 16
MEDIA
Q6272597
Jonathan Biss
PER
Q2905648
Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra
ORG
Q2066271
Swedish Radio Symphony
ORG
Q1173532
David Afkham
PER
Q829222
Berwaldhallen
EVE
Q239700
Piano Concerto No. 5
MEDIA
Q96379622
Gneixendorf Music – A Winter Journey
UNK
2019-01-01T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
2019
DATE
2020-02-13T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
February 13, 2020
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9
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16
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+5^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#decimal
5
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+16^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#decimal
16
NUMBER
notable work
composer
composer