Search - Ludwig van Beethoven, Frederic Chopin, Claude Debussy :: Sviatoslav Richter Plays Chopin, Debussy, Beethoven

This is simply magical

Norman Duffy | Amsterdam | 12/10/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Oh, to have been there! The first thing that struck me about this recording is the sheer beauty of the sound. Never having heard Richter in concert, it is fantastic to have a document like this. Richter's playing is subjected to close scrutiny and he wins every laurel imagineable.Chopin first. The scherzo is vintage Richter. Everything is exactly in its place. Its a piece that Richter played regularly and it shows. The waltzes are also delectably played, thoroughly and richly characterised, played with impeccable finesse and in great style. The Barcarolle is the finest performance I have heard since Lipatti. Very grand in concept, Richter manages to present the complex structure with a sense of absolute control and coherence. Some of the lyrical playing is absolutely ravishing and the climax is, for once, just that. The whole performance has been heading towards that moment and the sense of elation is absolute. Richter rounds off the piece with a wonderful sense of inevitability where many cannot avoid losing the plot somehow. This would be the performance of the disc for me if it weren't for the Debussy and particularly the Suite Bergamasque. The four pieces together constitute one of the most perfect suites known to man (or woman). Richter plays them all utterly perfectly and the atmosphere of repose he brings to the famed Claire de Lune is unique. Here I think is a perfect example of one of the most interesting and baffling facets of Richter's art.He takes the piece, Claire de Lune that is, extremely slowly. Lesser mortals such as I, who do play the suite reasonably successfully acccording to some, cannot help but wonder how Richter more than anyone had the ability to sustain huge structures at very intensely slow tempi. His Schubert is notorious for it. Some listeners do not react well but I find it simply mesmeric. The other Debussy, Estampes, a suite in three pieces, is subjected to a very personal interpretation that is remarkably consistent with a famous reading he recorded for DGG years ago. It will not be everyone's cup of tea, but I love it as I loved the earlier version.Then to the first piece in the recital. Beethoven's Andante Favori was the composer's first thoughts as the slow movemnet for the Waldstein Sonata. I can't imagine for a moment what he was thinking initially. The Andante is a fine piece but what ended up as the slow introduction to that finale of the Waldstein is so perfect, I cannot imagine this in there at all. Presumably the finale would have changed too!! Incidentally, the Chillean pianist Claudio Arrau apparently preferred Beethoven's first thoughts, beats me!Richter's way with this piece is again superb in every way. Wonderfully preportioned and articulated, I don't need another, although I probably already have 10 versions. This reading actually persuades you that this is Beethoven at his best middle period, which it probably isn't really, it just sounds it here.These days, I can really only imagine one pianist playing who can remind us of what it must have been like hearing the great Soviet giants of the past like Richter and Gilels. He is Grigory Sokolov who, typically, is notoriously averse to recording. He plays in concert with a concentration and intensity allied to massive technique and range that are overwhelming. There is no justice!! Anyway, buy this disc - it is pure gold."

Richter's Unmatched Insights Are Well Worth the Price

JMB1014 | USA | 03/24/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Unlike many pianists, Richter, a Russian-German from around the Ukraine who was famous for being his own worst critic, would not perform a piece unless he felt he could add something to the way it had been interpreted by others. This CD is an outstanding example of just how much Richter could add. He opens so many new windows onto these compositions that even if you have heard them for many years, you will find new insights and ways to hear, understand and enjoy this music. These are exquisite performances. It is almost as if Richter demands that he be able to justify each note as an intrusion on silence, and hews to a sort of baseline of calm, departing from it only when the music requires it, or perhaps examining each work from the ground up. There is no "wallpaper" here. I could not take any of these selections for granted. Richter has this effect in many cases, his Appassionata sonata, Rachmininoff 2d concerto and Tchaikowsky 1st being only the first examples I encountered as an adolescent. Over the ensuing years I have grown to understand how this man came to be lionized by so many. Though some pieces seem simple, Richter, through his unmatched capacity for reflection and interpretation, draws from them their inherent beauty, power and passion. The music on this recording enriches one's emotional and intellectual life. It is the opposite of New Age."

Yet another richter-freak-making device

Will Saar | ramapo valley, NJ | 05/29/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"if you search for 'richter' and see the cornucopia of >= 4 stars that appear, it gives the uninitiated an inkling. if you're a new-to-richter person: this is a wonderful introduction. the barcarolle is the only interpretation i've come across that can stand with sofronitsky's- not even horowitz's 'phantasmagoria' or argerich's flights of fancy , or rubinstein, others, none approach the completeness of this captured moment. The lilting beginning you get from the sample (above) is misleading, seems earthbound. it's a ruse that takes you in and through until the end, when you realize you were really just sitting there listening to music all the while, as the (belated, shocked)applause erupts. and the rest of the cd? my best friend recently found they were having a baby, and i'm in another country-so i sent my contribution to the new life's musical background.
i sent this cd taped (minus the scherzo, where richter shows some too-sharp claws)out of my whole 'classical' collection-now at some 840 discs."