Search - Alberto Ginastera, Leo Brouwer, Manuel Ponce :: Piano and Guitar

Discover A Dynamic Duo

D. Ch'an-Moriwaki | San Francisco, CA | 03/06/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is a quite stupendous pianist doing the Ginastera First Sonata, with razor-sharp articulation, transparent pedaling, wide dynamic range, rhythmic integrity, and arching lines, absolutely rewarding to listen to, over and over and over. I've not heard every Ginastera piano recording out there, but I've heard several of them, and Ms. Halasz's is outstanding - on the Brouwer and the Ponce as well. With the many-hued palette of her sensitive touch, especially highlighted in the Ginastera slow movement and the Ponce, the pianist is just splendid throughout. Maybe if we're lucky, one day Ms. Halasz will put out a big Ginastera recording. (I'd be among the first to buy.)



Not least in this recording's high marks, Ms. Halasz easily renders sensitively nuanced phrasing without any loss of definition, as the music blazes headlong in forte. Following along with the Ginastera score, I was most impressed indeed. With her dazzlingly clean technique, crisp, judicious pedal, and incisive articulation, this glittering, fast-paced music throws out its flashing shafts and sparks with the clarity of hard, diamond brilliance. This is so in the CD's Brouwer set as well, for both are dramatic works displaying fantasy, wild energy, and sharp-edged bravura.



Her pianism is ferocious, her musical judgment is keenly astute. In this respect, she obviously has the prowess to peg the tempi of the Ginastera and Brouwer pieces at higher notches. Doing so, however, would have meant sacrificing transparency, the acerbic pungency of this music's harmonic universe, and blurred the articulation of both performers. Certainly, more speed would have shortchanged their musical expressiveness.



It has been said that Ginastera was quite satisfied if his music's players presented his works with rhythmic truth. I prefer to believe that that was his necessary compromise when he was composing his coruscating, fabulous oeuvres several decades ago, when performers had not then evolved to today's musical standard of technical athleticism - a probably wise and realistic trade-off, just to have his music played at all and reach beyond his South American milieu.



But in the best of circumstances most ideal, no composer would accept anything less than full, rounded musicality and musicianship, simply because concert music demands impeccable, pristine performance. We're firmly in the twenty-first century now, and the performers of 20th-Century Classical music have attained the technical levels of elan and aplomb in all of this repertoire, the "abandon" such music demands and deserves without subordination of other vital musical/technical criteria. By now, anything less is simply unacceptable. But above all other expectations, unassailable musicianship is still the first and final arbiter. (See my comments on the Nissman boxed set of Ginastera.)



This Hungarian guitar-piano duo - he's American, and they both have the surname Halasz (Debora and Franz; maybe they're married to each other...?) - are remarkable musicians to keep an eye on, based on the merits of this CD, quite probably their first. (Came out perhaps 8 to 10 years ago... .) The guitar performance is equally superlative, musically and technically. Mr. Halasz has a very refined way with the voicings in the pieces, and in the Ginastera Guitar Sonata, he displays the exuberance, imagination, and abandon the sonata showcases. Regrettably, as in many recordings of the ensemble and orchestral guitar repertoire, the engineering doesn't place the guitarist forward enough. The balance between a big Steinway and the mild-voiced guitar needs better positioning and finer adjustment. This is the only disappointment of the CD - but happily, a small concession.















































































































































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