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Julian Joseph is a jazz pianist and composer, and presenter of Radio 3's Jazz Legends  and, sometimes, Jazz Line-up.  

• Julian Joseph plays an extract from Beethoven's Fifteenth String Quartet

'Usually I think with music that is written for you to interpret, you don't want to touch it or mess with it because the structure is so perfect. But in recent times I've started to actually go into Beethoven pieces that I really like and look for ways to have my own story on them. He is such a soulful, emotional, rhythmical musician, with a really good handle on harmony, and great technique, and he has opened up new territory for me. In Jazz, as we'd say, he's a bad cat! '

Julian's Recommendations:

Pianist Emile Gilels
'The way he plays Beethoven is the definitive way to play Beethoven on the piano'.


'I really fell in love with these in particular, and all of the string quartets, when I was in college. My relationship with some of them has started to change, because I have started to unravel them and play them in my own way, deciphering the harmony and using them as vehicles for improvisation, and analysing them in much more of a Jazz way.

Last Movement of the 15th String Quartet
'This is one piece in particular that I love doing - in A minor- it is the most beautiful piece of music, very haunting. I've taken parts of it and sort of fiddled around with it - not that you can fiddle around with Beethoven - but certainly I've tried to extend on it , to enjoy the harmony and the melody that comes through this piece.'

'I also love the way that the Julliard String Quartet and the LindsayQuartet play Beethoven. And the way that Sviatoslav Richter plays everything!!'