Daan Vandewalle - Rzewski A Mensch (2026) [Hi-Res]

Tracklist

CD1
01. De Profundis
02. Michael Bakunin,Rentier
03. Three Piano Pieces: 1. Salouette
04. Three Piano Pieces: 2. The Revelator
05. Three Piano Pieces: 3. That's That!
06. Dear Diary: 1. Stuporman
07. Dear Diary: 2. Names
08. Dear Diary: 3. No Good
09. Dear Diary: 4. Samson
10. Dear Diary: 5. Thanks
11. Worried

CD2
01. Dreams, Pt. I: 1. Dream
02. Dreams, Pt. I: 2. Cabrioles
03. Dreams, Pt. I: 3. A Mensch
04. Dreams, Pt. I: 4. Illusions Perdues
05. Dreams, Pt. II: 5. Bells
06. Dreams, Pt. II: 6. Fireflies
07. Dreams, Pt. II: 7. Ruins
08. Dreams, Pt. II: 8. Wake Up

CD3
01. Saints and Sinners
02. Tabakrauch: I. (Fire)
03. Tabakrauch: II. (Bridges)
04. Tabakrauch: III. (Eyes)
05. Tabakrauch: IV. (Cities)
06. A Life
07. Humanitas: 1.
08. Humanitas: 2.
09. Humanitas: 3.
10. Humanitas: 4.
11. Humanitas: 5.
12. Humanitas: 6. Coda alla vaccinara

CD4
01. Chain of Thought: I. Adagio e legato
02. Chain of Thought: II. Allegretto
03. Chain of Thought: III. Allegro con spirito
04. Rubinstein in Berlin
05. Mayn Yingele

The title of this album refers to the Yiddish word Mensch: literally a human being, but in everyday use someone who acts with integrity, awareness and responsibility. For Rzewski, the term carried exactly this meaning. A Mensch is not a perfect person, but someone who remains fully human - capable of doubt, contradiction and critical thought, and resistant to becoming passive within larger societal systems. This idea runs quietly but consistently through his work.

The pieces brought together here span more than sixty years, from the early 1950s to the last decade of his life, forming a kind of timeline across his career. The musical language changes, sometimes radically, but the underlying concerns remain strikingly constant. Rzewski's music engages with literature, politics and history, often through concrete situations - prison, injustice, personal crisis - but never in an abstract or detached way. The question is always how individuals relate to these forces, and whether they can remain human within them. In that sense, the ethical dimension of the Yiddish Mensch is not just a title, but something that can be heard throughout the programme.

Taken as a whole, this recording traces a composer who never gave up on the idea that music can carry meaning beyond itself. Across decades of work, his voice remains clear in its insistence that art can still ask what it means to live - and to act - as a human being.