Stephane Ginsburgh

The People United Will Never Be Defeated! from 1975 is one of Frederic Rzewski’s best-known compositions. The cyclical piece consists of a series of thirty-six variations on the protest song “¡El pueblo unido jamás será vencido!” (The united people will never be defeated!) by Chilean composer Sergio Ortega. The original combines influences from traditional Chilean folk music, European classical music, contemporary avant-garde, and political texts. In his own variations, Rzewski also draws on a variety of styles, between old and new, between popular and experimental. The composition is a tribute to the struggle of the Chilean people against oppression by the Pinochet regime, and by extension to other leftist movements throughout recent history. Not coincidentally, the piece also echoes the antifascist “Solidaritätslied” by Bertolt Brecht and Hanns Eisler and the Italian revolutionary song “Bandiera rossa,” as echoes of historical political resistance. The breathtaking virtuosity of Rzweski’s variations, especially in the epic interpretation by the pianist Stephane Ginsburgh, lends an intense emotionality to his abstract composition.