Top-Notch Richter
Jeffrey Lipscomb | Sacramento, CA United States | 06/24/2005
(5 out of 5 stars)
"As with many listeners, my musical tastes were largely formed by the very first records I owned (in my case, that was back in the 1960's). My piano teacher idolized both the piano music of Schumann and the piano playing of Rachmaninov, so naturally my first-ever "Carnaval" was Rachmaninov's on an RCA Camden LP (still un-matched imho). Soon after, I bought a mono Decca LP of "Waldscenen," performed to perfection by a Russian pianist whose name was then new to me: Sviatoslav Richter.
This extraordinary 2-disc BBC Legends set presents some of Richter's very finest playing. Like many of the greatest conductors (e.g., Furtwangler, Schuricht, Ancerl, etc.), Richter was usually more adventuresome and imaginative when playing "live" in front of a concert audience. Such is the case here. What follows is a brief rundown of this set's contents:
1. This marvelously alert and rhythmically inflected Haydn Sonata No. 37 is probably my favorite Richter performance of ANY Haydn. As Stephen Wigmore's excellent Amazon editorial here points out, this was once available on a long-gone Turnabout LP that was another of my earliest Richter records.
2. Richter's Chopin tended to be rather uneven from one performance to the next, but here the two Nocturnes are turned out as beautifully as any I have heard, right up there with the likes of Stefan Askenase & Tamas Vasary in their complete sets.
3. This Beethoven Sonata #11 in Richter's hands is a study in huge contrasts of both tempo and dynamics. It's a fairly objective reading (preferable in most respects to his studio account for Philips), but there are surprises around every corner. The only recording I have heard that transcends Richter's is the 1950's Kempff (arguably the finest single performance in that pianist's excellent mono DG set of the complete sonatas).
4. Beethoven's 15 Variations & Fugue on a Theme from "Prometheus" was sort of a preliminary sketch for the last mvt. of the then work-in-progress 3rd Symphony. That's why the work is usually known today as the "Eroica" Variations. Richter's emotionally satisfying performance is the finest I have heard (I also love the old Schnabel, but some of its passagework is a little rushed and unsteady).
5. Schumann was always one of Richter's strongest suits: only a handful of other pianists in my experience (e.g., Alfred Cortot, Yves Nat, Rachmaninov, and on occasion Walter Gieseking) could match his fire & poetry in this composer's music. Listening to Richter's account of the incredibly hard-to-play "Symphonic Etudes" is like eavesdropping on intimate and deeply private ruminations. As was his custom, Richter squeezes all five of the posthumous variations (published by Brahms with Clara's consent) between etudes 6 & 7. Of the three "live" versions that I have by Richter, this one is the most forceful and slightly more extroverted (the others: the more subtle account on Olympia CD and the even more poetic interpretation in Richter's 15-disc Praga CD set). My other favorite readings are those by Nat (EMI) and Freire (INA).
6. Words fail me when it comes to these 12 Rachmaninov etudes: not even the composer's accounts are as incredibly colorful and fluent as what Richter gives us here.
In short, this CD set is one of the finest examples of Richter's artistry it has ever been my pleasure to hear.
Highest recommendation.
Jeff Lipscomb"
Highly recommended
jt52 | New Jersey | 08/23/2006
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Jeff Lipscomb has done a great job reviewing this CD so I wanted to comment that the performances of the Rachmaninoff Preludes and the Schumann Symphonic Etudes by Richter here are the two best of that music I've ever heard. Can't say I've comapred it with every alternative but I've listened to a number of them and Richter's are just superb. "Magical" is another word that comes to mind in relation to the Rachmaninoff."
