19 FLORIAN NOACK In the shadow of his symphonies and string quartets, Shostakovich’s famous Waltz no.2 bears witness to the Russian composer’s incredible versatility. As a student, he accompanied silent films on the piano, and in his early years he devoted much of his time to ballet, incidental music and film music – we even owe him an orchestral version of Tea for Two. Originally written for the Soviet film The First Echelon (1956), this waltz has since travelled the world, having been reused in films by Stanley Kubrick and Lars von Trier, as well as in countless advertisements, to become perhaps his most popular work. ‘I wanna be like you’ was composed by the Sherman Brothers, Richard and Robert, for Disney’s The Jungle Book (1967). Written for Louis Prima, who voices King Louie in the cartoon, the song obviously evokes New Orleans jazz. My piano version was originally a gift for my sister, who had always loved this number. Gradually, as I found myself driven by the urge to transpose to the piano the complexity, polyrhythm and idiom so typical of this music, and probably also tantalised by the pleasure of the technical challenge, the transcription grew in size to the version presented here. I hope that these transcriptions will give the listener as much pleasure as I had in writing them.
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