Richter has written that he wanted to use period instruments on the original Recomposed recording but couldn't interest recording companies in the idea. Is Richter simply trying to milk his original concept? Maybe, but in a sense, this was and remains the point. Deutsche Grammophon's notes reassure classical listeners that they may not recognize the difference between the Moog and the earlier contemporary electronics, and perhaps this is a problem as well for the many young electronic music fans who have come to Richter, but for anyone around in the 1970s, Richter's bass lines and sonic washes will be quite recognizable. He also recruits London's ethnically diverse Chineke! Orchestra, gives them gut-stringed period instruments on which to play (the players were using these for the first time, and this works quite a bit better than you might expect), and collaborates with a new violinist, the wirier Elena Urioste in place of Daniel Hope, and also uses 'period' electronics, playing a vintage Moog synthesizer himself. Now, Richter has remade Recomposed, even recomposing it a bit the new album is just under four minutes shorter than its predecessor. It has become almost as ubiquitous as the concertos on which it was based. For those rare souls who haven't encountered it, it was a sort of contemporary remake of Vivaldi's Four Seasons violin concertos, using the originals as thematic source material to a greater or lesser degree and subjecting them to electronic treatment. Max Richter's 2012 Recomposed album was an enormous success, topping charts in many countries (not just the usual classical-oriented ones) and making its way onto numerous soundtracks, including that for the television series Bridgerton.

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Richter four seasons