Search - Lecuona, Pegoraro :: Piano Works 2

GOOD PIANIST, WRONG REPETOIRE

DK | Miami, FL USA | 07/28/2000

(1 out of 5 stars)

"This, and the first recording of Pegoraro's Lecuona recordings came on the heels of re-release of Lecuona's own recordings of his piano music, and the extremely well presented and authentic interpretations of Tirino playing his complete piano music on the BIS Label. Ms. Pegoraro is a good pianist, but in this repetoire she lacks entirely. While her first volume is listenable in certain moments, this second disk is not, and leaves much to be desired. The playing has very little color, technical panache (compare her tempo of Aragon compare to Tirino's on Vol.1 of his BIS series-she is much slower). One can say that she is serviceable in Aragonesa and other spanish form pieces such as Granada, etc.-the reason for that probably being somewhat like Albeniz, so there is a point of reference. The one area where Ms. Pegoraro TOTALLY fails though is in her interpretations of the Danzas Cubanas, both on this and her previous CD. She simply does not understand what the danza form is, how to project it, and lacks the feeling and delivery of the form. It is lackluster, without changing middle sections, limps along, and is just plain awful quite frankly. Equally compare Tirino's Polka to hers-hers is very pedantic. As a Cuban-and knowing these works and forms, I would say this CD is an interesting compilation-but despite certain hype I have noticed about her Lecuona playing-she is NO Lecuona expert in the least. If you want to hear how these pieces should really be played-go get the Tirino series of dics on Lecuona's music on BIS-he is the real thing, closest to Lecuona's interpretations, and knows and feels just what the styles, forms, and colors are for these pieces. They leave this recording, and her first volume quite honestly, in the dust."

Music by a master

scafide@kochint.com | New York City | 01/18/1999

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I bought this disc on a whim and found it to be quite enjoyable. I have listened to it several times and find myself hearing new detail with each listening. The piano sound is very clear, and the playing is honest. I didn't know Lecuona wrote so much piano music. Ms. Pegoraro's playing is first class."