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I have always been enamoured with the early romanticism of Sergei Rachmaninoff’s ‘In the Silence of the Secret Night’, the third of his Six Romances Op.4 (1890-93). As a pianist, I wanted to recast this vocal setting of lines by Afanasy Fet as a purely instrumental work and, in so doing, pay homage to the great tradition of transcription established by the likes of Liszt, Busoni and, of course, Rachmaninoff himself. While other great pianists have transcribed this song in the past – often rather opulently, perhaps closer to the Rachmaninoff of the 1930s – in my own version I set out to dress the musical material in piano textures more typical of the composer’s style c.1900-1910.

Kirill Gerstein