Flutist Peter-Lukas Graf and guitarist Konrad Ragossnig have appeared together in concert and have been bound in personal friendship for many, many years. This recording presents a selection of favorite miniatures and encore pieces from their vast duo repertoire – a wonderful idea ! It is a diverse selection of charming, serious and lighter works extending from the Baroque period (Johann Sebastian Bach and Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach) to the Rococo (Niccolò Paganini and François Joseph Gossec), the Classic (Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) and the Romantic (Frédéric Chopin and Piotr Ilitch Tchaikovsky). It is likewise delightful to see brave excursions into 20th century music, including Rags by Scott Joplin, pieces by Heitor Villa-Lobos, Jacques Ibert and Maurice Ravel, as well as dances from Aram Khatchaturian’s ballet “Gayaneh”.

Graf and Ragossnig lend these miniatures (of one and a half to seven minutes in length) their personal signature with their famed technical mastery and interpretative skills. As is often the case in live concerts, once the official program has been completed and the audience has been won over, musicians are able to enjoy a certain liberty and spontaneous creative energy during the following encores that is not present in the “official” part of the concert. Peter-Lukas Graf and Konrad Ragossnig have placed these exquisite miniatures in the spot-light for once, and the result is 60-minute program of great variety and listening pleasure.