We reviewed Clifton Edition’s volumes of Teresa Carreño’s music (‘Venezuelan Treasures for Piano’, Vols 4 & 5) in the Winter 2024 issue, and it has been fascinating to explore more from this enterprising publishing house. The Venezuelan composer Federico Ruiz Hurtado (born 1948) has written a significant and attractive output for piano that has been championed by Clara Rodriguez. This fascinating series of three volumes, edited by Rodriguez, presents a wide range of Ruiz’s contrasted and most important piano works.

Volume 1 consists of 15 ‘Pieces for children under 100 years of age’. This colourful and immediate music will provide inspiration for intermediate players as well as entertainment for more experienced pianists. After a Pachelbel-Canon-like opening Prelude, the cycle moves on a whistle-stop tour with homages to Petrushka (Song of the Organ-grinder) and Bartók (Encounter of Antonio and Florentino). There is much that seems sun-kissed and nostalgic, as well as evocations of Piazzolla, waltzes and elegiac miniatures (less is more, as in Magic Dream). With a clear layout and pleasurable piano-writing, this deserves widespread currency.

Taking pride of place in these three volumes is Tríptico Tropical in Volume 2, a large-scale bravura work that never loses its exquisitely mellow nature, even in its most technically furious passages. The central Andante appears as though Poulenc had ventured into South America and is bathed with spacious nostalgia. Exquisite jazz chords mix with often sparse textures to create a gentle melancholy that is beguiling. More jazz influences can be found in the wistful first movement, an enchantingly original cocktail of contrasted dance rhythms as atonality and more conventional harmonies rub shoulders. The rondo-structured finale is reminiscent of salsa, conga and calypso dances, full of optimism, joy and generosity of spirit. The second volume also contains the characterful 5/8-metre Merengue, a dance steeped in Venezuelan tradition, and Zumba que Zumba, a short vibrant number commissioned by Clara Rodriguez and full of vibrant immediacy. Merengue is rather more subtle in nature: as accents shift, a persuasive if rather complex flavour emerges. Not for the faint‑hearted!

‘Notturno’, which opens Volume 3, is a large-scale, quasi-orchestral soundscape with impressive open textures and notably lugubrious episodes. There are Venezuelan influences en route (waltz and joropo flavourings) as well as much chromaticism – this would benefit from an elasticity of pulse in performance. The three Venezuelan Waltzes that follow are more traditional: ‘Carmen Rosa’, written especially for Rodriguez, is a transcription from incidental music Ruiz wrote for the play Office Number One, while ‘Aliseo’ is an even more modest transcription that originated as part of a score for the 1995 film Aire libre. This would be attractive material for an early-intermediate player of around Grade 4-5 level.

By far the most radical music in this series is contained in the compact but challenging dodecaphonic Micro-Suite. Evidently based on a note row from Ernst Krenek, this is far from a merely cerebral exercise, containing much that is contrasted and characterful. The most substantial music is a Passacaglia (not much longer than 60 seconds in length) that makes use of the retrograde and retrograde-inversion of the series. Though perhaps challenging for listeners, this Suite lies perfectly within the grasp of post-Grade 8 players and could be useful for teachers in search of music to give students their first encounter with serialism – it is comparable in terms of difficulty with Schoenberg’s Six Little Pieces, Op 19, and most of Edward Gregson’s (Schoenberg-influenced) Six Little Piano Pieces.

This review originally appeared in the SPRING 2025 issue of International Piano