Search - Einojuhani Rautavaara, Max Pommer, Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra :: Rautavaara: Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 2

Back to tradition in Rautavaara's opus

Crt Sojar Voglar | Ljubljana, Slovenia | 01/11/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Rautavaara composed his first piano concerto in 1968. He purposely returned to the spirit of Rachmaninov, as he believed the modernism has no value any more. Hence the concerto in "grand style" as he described it.

The opening chords, enriched with diatonic clusters and added "false" notes are melodicaly simple thus memorable and effective. The whole first movement is narratively convincing. Second movement has some extreme contrasts; sometimes there are beautiful melodies presented, the suddenly the soloists punches your ears with brutal clusters and harsh dissonances. The third movement is a short dance-like scherzo, so typical of Rautavaara; he has never written a long fast movement in his long composition.



The second piano concerto is different, the main difference is the flexibile connection between soloist and orchestra. Yet, this concerto is less impressive the first one, probably because it does not have so many memorable melodies and the form is perhaps too opened and you can't really find much difference in each of the three movements. I prefer the first concerto over the second. Nevertheless, both works are solid achievement in Rautavaara's opus which has been so wide in stylistic orientations from avantgarde to romantic background."