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Subdued, sleepy and despised by snobs: how minimalist piano eclipsed classical music
Their soothing tones and hypnotic arpeggios amass gigantic listening figures on ‘chill’ Spotify playlists, but composers such as Nils Frahm are shunned by the classical world
It can be heard on film and TV soundtracks, adverts and call-centre hold music, and behind that trickledown lies an enormous number of albums, singles and playlists by pianist-composers now attracting more listeners than most big names of classical piano performance. Photograph: J-M Quinet/AlamyTake Riopy, a French pianist-composer who spent his childhood in a cult, ultimately escaping it, and now records his signature brand of meditative keyboard-rippling for Warner Classics. This may be strange considering that, in the course of our conversation, Frahm talks energetically about a vast array of musicians, from Thelonious Monk and Valentin Silvestrov to JS Bach and Heinrich Biber.
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