A Stunning Recital
Hank Drake | Cleveland, OH United States | 09/30/2006
(5 out of 5 stars)
"The original release of Horowitz at the Met, the pianist's first digital recording, was one of the first CDs I bought when I got my first player in 1986. The clarity and beauty of sound was nothing short of astonishing back then. This recording captures Horowitz in his autumnal prime in works he was obviously comfortable with.
Horowitz almost single handedly ressurected Scarlatti, and his approach to these elusive works consistenly illuminates. He almost never embellished the text, but provides more than enough variety with an endless pallette of tone colors.
Horowitz seemed more at home in Chopin's Ballade #4 than he did in the first Ballade. The phrasing, dynamics, and dramatic build up are just so "right" here, that one can scarcely imagine a better performance--even with the occasional minor slip of finger.
Liszt's Ballade is more bombastic than anything else. Horowitz fills the work with such epic "mad-scientist" fury, one can actually take the work seriously, at least until the track ends.
The Chopin Waltz combines both--very different--editions of Chopin's text, with perhaps a dash of Horowitz' melancholy.
The Rachmaninoff Prelude has a swinging beat that one seldom hears from this piece. The central section is as sexily voiced as a siren's song. The applause at the end is most welcome.
"