With this disc, Austrian pianist Hardy Rittner takes time out from his series of recordings of the complete piano music of Brahms to record the complete piano music of Schoenberg. The stylistic leap is not as far as some might think, because while Schoenberg went on to "invent" atonal and serial music, he was born into late Romanticism, and his earliest music is clearly written in that style. This stylistic development is demonstrated in Schoenberg's seven published works for solo piano: the atonal Opp. 11 and 19, plus the serial Opp. 23, 25, and 33a and 33b, as well as his early Drei Klavierstücke. No matter what the style, Rittner makes a strong case for each work.

An extraordinary program for an extraordinary night: The Berliner Philharmoniker celebrates the final day of the 20th Century with Grand Finales in the first part and heralds the leap into the 21st Century with an explosion of sparkling music pieces in the second half of the program. For the Grand Finales, maestro Claudio Abbado conducts masterpieces including Beethoven's finale of the 7th symphony, excerpts from Stravinsky's "Feuervogel" and the final movement of Mahler's 5th Symphony. In the famous Finale of Arnold Sch+Ýnberg's "Gurrelieder", the internationally renowned actor Klaus Maria Brandauer plays a leading role.