Search - Frederic Chopin, Vladimir Horowitz :: Chopin: Piano Music

More like a parody

hjonkers | The Netherlands | 06/01/2004

(2 out of 5 stars)

"The good news about this disc is that RCA's remastering is excellent: even though these performances are some 25 years old, nearly every detail of the pianist is beautifully captured and the piano tone is great.



That does not apply to the playing, unfortunately. The G minor ballade and Fantaisie-Polonaise are simply frustrating. Oh certainly, Horowitz has a lovely tone most of the time, and it's pretty well audible that this is not your neighbour playing. At spare moments he gives wonderful new insights into these pieces. But even then, his distorting manners and brittle fingers cannot be excused. Especially nasty is his habit to slam very hard on a few chords when his technique has left him alone for a while. And this happens just a bit too often, especially in the trickier sections of the ballade. The coda of the poor piece is just butchered. His over-the-top and endlessly dragging phrasing in both works isn't very pleasant either and gives a chaotic feeling. And if you know that VH does not play the last chord of the Polonaise in ff (as Chopin wrote), but the last TWO chords instead, that indicates well how awful the rest of this performance is, too.



A little better -less crude- are the Barcarolle and F minor ballade, yet here too the distorting and messy phrasing makes them hard to enjoy. The barcarolle merely sounds like a boat that has lost its direction, and I don't get any idea of a clue in Horowitz' playing. The F minor Ballade, although clearer, is still so exaggeratedly charged that I can't really enjoy it. And the coda is, once again, a banged-up mess. As for the two etudes: the c sharp minor is quite bad but the G flat major makes something good: although he clearly slowed down for technical reasons, the piece sounds politer than usually and most textures are nicely laid out. A pity that he decided to exaggerate the last notes so much, however.



The nocturnes are recordings from 1957, apparently representing Horowitz in better form. But these pieces too are a disappointment: the recorded sound is dry and dull (not sure whose fault this is) and Horowitz' playing itself doesn't make too much sense either: it is all too busy and indifferent and fails reach depth. It doesn't sound as if he really loved the pieces.



At least the closure of this `recital' is worth it, a little waltz that is beautifully coloured and charming. But this is a disc that should be avoided nevertheless: it is frustrating to hear how so many great pieces are mistreated by a pianist at a less good day of his. Try looking for Horowitz' earlier Sony recordings of Chopin and see why RCA should be really ashamed for this awful release."

24bit/96kHZ Resolution

Jian Zhuang | Granite Bay, CA USA | 09/30/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This year 2001 issue contains all previously released material. Total of 11 pieces with playing time 73 minites were coming from "Horowitz in London - 1982", "Horowitz at Met - 1981", in concert 1979~1980 and 4 Nocturnes were recorded in 1957. All the piano playing here are excellent as always found in all other Horowitz recordings which are just can not go wrong. The value in this issue is that these pieces were digitally remastered in higher resolution 24bit/96kHZ."