MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             

CD REVIEW



Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger

alternatively Crotchet


 

 

Pyotr Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)
Piano Concerto No. 1 in B flat minor Op.23 (1874/75) [36:20]
Alexander SCRIABIN (1872-1915)
Piano Concerto in F sharp minor Op.20 (1897) [28:58]
Nikolai Demidenko (piano)
BBC Symphony Orchestra/Alexander Lazarev
rec. 10-11 July 1993, CTS Studios, Wembley, United Kingdom
HYPERION HELIOS CDH55304 [65:16]

This CD was originally released as Hyperion CDA66680, and now appears as a top notch recording and performance at budget price on Hyperion’s ‘Helios’ label. 

Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No.1 is one of those pieces which has slipped in and out of my collection over the years. The one constant has been a lovely old LP copy of Sviatoslav Richter and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra under Herbert von Karajan from 1962. With very few minutes per side it has grooves like the guttering on a skittle alley and is a fine example of Deutsche Grammophon’s uncompromising attitude to quality over quantity. There are innumerable versions available on CD, notably with both Martha Agerich/Abbado and Lang Lang/Barenboim currently on DG, Mikhail Pletnev/Fedoseyev on Virgin and Emil Gilels/Reiner on RCA just to name a few heavyweight variants. With so many to chose from it seems almost pointless trying to pick and choose, and in the end Hyperion are making life easy for us by making such an engaging and involving recording accessible for less that the price of two pints of lager in a London pub. Demidenko’s technique is immaculate, and both his and that of Lazarev are muscular and athletic – pulling no punches in the first movement and the more skittish final Allegro con fuoco. The central Andante semplice has poetry and grace, and the whole thing is recorded with all the gloss and transparency one could hope for. This performance may possibly be lacking the last ounce of grandiose nobility or weighty heroism. However, you never get the feeling that there are any symbolic messages being over-emphasised, and I never felt I was missing anything either. 

The other really ascendant or transcendent star on this disc is a magical and gorgeously transparent recording of Scriabin’s Piano Concerto in F sharp minor. This was Scriabin’s first work to involve an orchestra, but the effortless dialogue between soloist and various sections and individuals from the orchestra show a natural feel for texture and the heightening of effect when piling on the emotional show for big tunes, or for the subtle touches of detail in numerous delightful counter-melodies. The matching of simplicity and waves of romantic splendour are well handled in the balance of this recording, so that things never seem to get stodgy. Worlds apart, Scriabin’s music was however recognised and respected by a forward looking composer such as Stravinsky, who no doubt identified a fellow individualist and warrior against bland conformity – the two in any case got on well enough when they met on a train journey not long before Scriabin’s untimely death. Scriabin’s idiom in this concerto is unashamedly romantic, but some colleagues such as Rimsky-Korsakov were less than enthusiastic. The work was generally well received elsewhere however, and a quick look in the current catalogue show it to be a fairly popular work, if not quite as universally accepted and over-exposed as the Tchaikovsky. Collectors concerned that this concerto will be as hard to digest as some of Scriabin’s later, more ‘transcendental’ works need have no fears; if anything the work shares more with the romanticism of Chopin, with a directness of utterance which is easy to follow and hard not to find attractive. 

With Ateş Orga’s informative original booklet notes included, this is a re-issue which ticks all the boxes on any scale of quality. Don’t be put off by the dismally muddy scene on the cover: these are colourful recordings of performances which can cure you of the need to seek out any other.

Dominy Clements

 

 


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Chandos recordings
All Chandos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 

Return to Review Index

Untitled Document


Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.