Exciting young pianist Julius Asal performs an utterly absorbing recital of Russian music, along with a brand new commission from Lera Auerbach.

Prokofiev was in an unusually introspective mood when he composed his Pensées in 1935. His music is often spiky, or at a breakneck tempo, or both. These rarely-played miniatures are by contrast slow and contemplative for the most part. For Julius Asal, who has a particular affinity with Prokofiev’s music, they “reflect Prokofiev’s doubts about life in Paris and the desire, which has grown over the years, to return to his old homeland”. This he did the following year, where he premiered the Pensées in Moscow: his desire fulfilled.

Rachmaninoff’s 13 Préludes were composed in 1910 in the slipstream of his famously beautiful (and famously difficult) Third Piano Concerto. Written for his own formidable abilities at the keyboard, they are intricate and often challenging. But they encompass a beguiling range of moods and styles, from stormy to tender to dreamy to playful. Overall they are a remarkable testament to the expressive range of the piano – and to Rachmaninoff’s muscular performing style.

Composer, pianist, visual artist and poet Lera Auerbach was born in Russia, but moved to the USA aged 17. Her compositions often take inspiration from extra-musical sources, and in her new piece for Julius Asal (a co-commission with BBC Radio 3) she responds to the series of undelivered love letters written by Emma Hauck – confined to a psychiatric institution in 1909 – to her husband. Her letters consist of just two words, written over and over again: “Herzensschatzi, komm” (“Darling, come”).

Julius Asal piano