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« Mr. Stephen Gosling also performed the program’s opening piece, the New York premiere of Fabio Grasso’s “Blumentraum.” The title is a homage to “Blumenstücke” by the German writer Jean Paul, which inspired Schumann’s work of the same name. Mr. Grasso quotes the theme of Schumann’s score in this effective work, whose gauzy, impressionistic colors are meant to evoke (according to the notes) a “peaceful spring scene in the tender morning light.”».

Vivien Schweitzer, The New York Times, April 9th 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/09/arts/music/09wash.html

« Stephen Gosling began the concert with Fabio Grasso’s “blumentraum.” The piece is for

piano solo or, alternately, with flute, violin, and cello “ad libitum.” The piano by itself

more than sufficed to make a stirring musical impression. Created as homage to both

the writer Jean Paul and Robert Schumann’s “Blumenstücke” (a work he inspired), the

piece actually seems to channel a more Impressionist musical language, with

shimmering washes of scalar passages, lush chords, and a supple rhythmic ebb and flow.

The score itself (which the composer was kind enough to send along to this writer in

advance of the concert) seems daunting at first glance; its graphic notation, cutaway

styled layout, and snatches of aleatory making it look formidably challenging to execute.

That may well be the case, but in Mr. Gosling’s hands, “blumentraum” was pervaded

with a seemingly effortless fluidity of diaphanous mobility.»

Christian Carey, Musical America, www.musicalamerica.com

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