Comparison Recordings:
Emil Gilels, Sonata #2 RCA LP LSC 2868
Vladimir Viardo, Sonata #2 Elektra Nonesuch
9 79234-2
When Ashkenazy plays
Shostakovich, something wonderful happens
that has never happened before. This
is the first credible performance of
the Second Sonata. There may
be several reasons other than the one
I’ve alluded to. First, in his Fifteenth
Symphony Shostakovich revealed several
things about himself he had never revealed
before — notably he showed up the critics
who had seriously underestimated the
influences of Rossini and of the German
Romantics in his work. Performances
accomplished before the Fifteenth
Symphony was performed might be
done in relative ignorance of these
influences. Ashkenazy has played Schumann
brilliantly, and I hear the influence
of Schumann in Ashkenazy’s performance
of this sonata whereas neither I nor
the other performers who have recorded
this work, even those who knew Shostakovich,
seem to have heard it.
After the Sonata,
the rest of the works on this disk are
very brief, the shortest only 29 seconds
long. The Five Preludes of 1921
are distinct works from the 24 Preludes
of Opus 34 (1935) or the Preludes
and Fugues of Opus 87, not earlier
versions of these later works. The three
Fantastic Dances were originally
published as Op 1, Op 2, and Op 3, and
later gathered and republished as Opus
5, which is what is shown in the track
listing. But Eric Rosebury in his notes
refers to them as "Opus 1" perhaps because,
like me, he owns the earlier edition
of the music. The first two of the Fantastic
Dances are very reminiscent of Satie.
Aphorism #3, Nocturne,
is written without bar lines or key
signature. The following Elegy,
written without key signature in alternating
4/4 and 5/4 time seems almost as free
in tempo, whereas the succeeding numbers
make almost sarcastic use of strict
dance rhythms. #8 Canon, again
with no key signature, is as close to
12 tone music as Shostakovich ever got.
The Legend is almost frightening
in its moody, mysterious growling sound.
Lullaby is a very free singing
line over a regular ostinato
bass. In these brief, brilliant, highly
experimental works Shostakovich roughed
out the musical territory he would spend
the rest of his life exploring in detail.
This is the first Decca
high resolution recording I have encountered,
and you will note that it is not
a DSD recording, which is all to the
good. My observation is that 4.0 surround
sound is entirely adequate for solo
piano. The discrete surround tracks
will accurately reproduce the acoustic
of the recording studio. The producer
has evidently set up some highly reflective
panels near the piano in the recording
studio (or the piano has some odd internal
resonance, which is unlikely) to give
an emphasised, even sarcastic, brilliance
to the piano’s high notes, but in the
surround tracks this results in an echo
that some may find objectionable. You
may prefer, as I do, to play the 2.0
stereo SACD tracks utilising your surround
sound decoder for a warmer and more
realistic sound. And, again, the CD
tracks on this SACD will not play on
my Sony DDU 1621 computer DVD drive,
and Sony has not yet offered any firmware
update to correct the problem, which
does not occur with my other Sony drives.
Paul Shoemaker
Paul
Shoemakers guide to audio formats
Vladimir Ashkenazy (piano) 
Hybrid
SACD playable on SACD players and CD players
