There is a long and noble tradition of Bach interpretation
on the piano, and Youri Egorov, who died tragically young, makes an
interesting contribution to its literature. He has both the technical
resource and the musical imagination to make an expressive point in
the service of Bach's remarkable and truly indestructible music. And
taken as a recital, judged on its own terms, his performance gives much
pleasure. The recorded sound is ambient, with a pleasing perspective
which gives clarity to dynamic shadings. These things are just what
is required for Bach's keyboard music.
However, there are some significant drawbacks, which
are sufficient to put the disc out of court as a recommendation. First
of all, it plays for a mere 37 minutes, roughly half what the prospective
purchaser is likely to encounter elsewhere. Then the documentation is
thin, to put it mildly. There is nothing whatsoever about the music,
only a badly translated and poorly proofed biography of the artist.
As if to compound that problem with production standards, neither the
three Preludes and Fugues nor the Italian Concerto is given separate
cue-points for individual movements, thus making it difficult for the
listener to locate individual sections of the music. These things may
have happened during the early days of CD, but they are unacceptable
today.
The most interesting performance is that of the B minor
Prelude and Fugue (No. 24 of Book 1). Egorov takes a boldly slow tempo
for both sections, to the extent that some might find his interpretation
bizarre. It would be impossible to perform the music this way on the
harpsichord, the instrument for which Bach conceived it, and as such
the tempo and the withdrawn pianissimo dynamic are inauthentic. Yet
it is a tribute to Bach's consummate imagination and skill that the
performance achieves a strangely mesmeric and compelling effect. Try
listening to the opening (TRACK 3 0.00) of the Prelude, and the point
is immediately made. No other performance is likely to be remotely like
it, since it lasts more than 17 minutes. The fugue only serves to intensify
the visionary experience (TRACK 3 14.23), making a slow but inexorable
progress of remarkable concentration.
After this the Italian Concerto (TRACK 4 0.00) lifts
the clouds and is altogether more 'normal' as an interpretation. In
fact it is thoroughly uplifting. Although this is a challenging CD recital,
full of interest, it is pity that its brevity and the spectacularly
poor production standards undermine it as a competitive commercial proposition.
Terry Barfoot
NOTE •
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Youri Egorov (piano) 
