Víkingur Ólafsson: Bach’s Goldberg Variations by Bach, J. S., From (2024/2024), Cultural Foundation Abu Dhabi, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates

Icelandic pianist Víkingur Ólafsson is a phenomenon. Like no other classical musician in the past year, he has managed to combine wide popular success with the highest artistic standards. With his recording of the Goldberg Variations, released in October 2023, he immediately propelled himself into the exclusive ranks of the finest Bach interpreters, his name now being mentioned together with the timeless Glen Gould or Wanda Landowska. His balance between the individuality of each section and the sense of its shape, maintained over the work’s 75 minutes, has been praised in numerous reviews. Víkingur Ólafsson’s unified, flawless, nostalgic, but at the same time life-affirming vision of the work has led to his CD appearing in all the overviews of best recordings of 2023 (for example in the 'Best of 2023' by the New York Times) and has become a sales hit for his label, Deutsche Grammophon. For his first appearance in the United Arab Emirates, the Icelandic pianist will be offering this magical performance of Bach’s Goldberg Variations as part of the famed Abu Dhabi Classics concert series. It will be a true highlight that the country’s classical music lovers will look forward to. The composer, Johann Sebastian Bach, left no instructions as to how the music should be played, allowing a great deal of interpretative latitude. Ólafsson will offer his enchanting, fresh and exciting rendition of the monumental work — one he has adapted to our time, taking the past into account, but also opening its notes to the musical innovations of the 21st century. Ólafsson’s rendition explores the realities of our modern world, and forms another proof that Bach’s masterpiece really does belong to each time period in which it is played.