“My piano transcription of Rachmaninoff’s Sonata for Cello and Piano, Opus 19 was an obstacle to go around in circles without starting for several years. Finally, I took a deep breath and started to work. The transcription was written in two months, completed in August 2014 and premiered the same month in the Steinway Gallery in Boca Raton, Florida.”

© Asiya Korepanova

 
Asiya’s initial desire to make this transcription grew from a real passion for this piece and a dream to make it available for a solo piano performance. In a blog post immediately before the premiere, Asiya discusses in more detail her reasons for creating the transcription. She then reveals her thoughts, after the performance, on the mental impact of performing a piece that she is so familiar with in a completely new musical context.
 
Over her career, the Cello sonata has become one of Asiya’s favorite chamber pieces to perform. However, she became frustrated with the lack of opportunities to play it and with specific acoustic issues about this piece. Her transcription, hailed as "a miraculous achievement" by New York Classical Review, is a remedy to this circumstance, a loving tribute to one of her favorite composers, a contribution to the solo piano repertoire and the first transcription of this Sonata in its entirety that have been ever made.