Burkard Schliessmann

"As so often I have pointed out, intuition is a level of the highest range. In details, I don’t have to think or to worry about the realization of my interpretation; no, it’s something that spreads out…"

"I’m very skeptical in approaching Bach as a clean slate. To understand Bach, one has to be at home in the whole literature of art and interpretation; one must have great experience in performing the c…"

"Ascetic rigor? This doesn’t mean something like ‘renounce’ or even a ‘lack’ of something. No, it means, in philosophical manner , a special kind of internal yearning, a special power wherein, despite …"

"It’s quite an obsession to me to communicate at this moment, at this time, with my audience. I don’t only play for them, it’s something I want to give back to them. I feel how each listener in the aud…"

"Undoubtedly the best language for the expression of this ‘unfathomable’ quality was music. The infinity of musical spheres of expression, independent of rationality, is often perceived as ‘unfathomabl…"

"Schliessmann is the best pianist I know at entering the world and expressing the awareness of the German romantics."

"Herz, Thalberg, Heller, Felicien David and others were great virtuosos of their time, more famous than Chopin himself. They had their own personal styles, but the essence of their music was time-bound…"

"The things that are most important to me in such a project are perfectionism and truth. Truth of interpretation, truth of sound, truth of the instrument, truth of the hall, truth lastly of all. This m…"