A gaping hole in the flute repertoire opened during the first half of the nineteenth century. It was not until the genial Theobald Boehm carried through his technical improvements on the transverse flute, formerly imperfect but now endowed with radiant sound, that this instrument once again was able to interest composers.

The FlautoPiano Duo with Helen Dabringhaus and Fil Liotis surprises us with a program brimming with wit and virtuoso lightness and featuring none other than Ludwig van Beethoven.

Here Beethoven’s Serenade is of course a must. The master himself supervised the arrangement for flute & piano duo of one of his few works assigning a challenging part to the flute; by then a highly sought after composer, he evidently had no time to perform this task on his own.

Beethoven’s authorship of a Sonata, possibly from his Bonn period, is steeped in legend; this uncommonly witty and nimble work offers us a very different picture of this composer.