Liszt: Piano Concertos Nos.1 & 2; Totentanz

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Music reviews of Liszt: Piano Concertos Nos.1 & 2; Totentanz

Music Review: They never quite take this music *far* enough
Rating: 3 Stars

Take the second part of the Second Concerto, labeled Allegro agitato assai. It's not agitato enough to my ears. The strings do not bear down hard enough with their bows. The tympani sounds muffled, soft. The following movement, which brings us down to earth following the heaven-storming of the previous one, does not bring us very far. It's not all that tender and lyrical, despite, or maybe because of, lots of heavy vibrato. It's as if they're faking it. Contrast Richter/Kondrashin on Philips for a thrilling ride, with a savage, slashing opening movement (that at the same time never gets away from the players), and a lyrical second movement of unearthly beauty. It would take too much space here to give many A-B examples like that, but another is the trill leading into Allegretto vivace in the First Concerto. When Zimerman plays it it's just a trill. When Richter plays it, and Kondrashin accompanies him, it's so tactile you can almost feel it, "hushed pianissimo." By barely touching the keys, Richter manages to bring forth the most delicate sound, somewhere between glass and air. This extreme, coming on the heels of the heaven-storming previous movement (where they shake up the joint much more than Zimerman/Ozawa) just makes for gooseflesh on the arms. Kondrashin has a better grasp of the structure too, phrasing parts to remind you of a connection earlier or later in the piece with another line, for example. You can really hear the interconnectivity between movements and within movements. By contrast, the present recording is on the whole little more than perfunctory, with everyone playing THE NOTES but adding little more to the reading. (The exception is Charlie Schleuter, who adds a loud and overly-bright first trumpet that occasionally goes sharp in loud passages.)

If these were obscure pieces of I'd recommend this disc without hesitation. It's all generally well-played and well-recorded. (I'm another one who doesn't hear those "obvious problems" in the loud passages, even when following the score and listening on Grado audiophile headphones.) But these are warhorses--or certainly the first is--and why go with this average recording in a crowded field of extraordinary performances that bring more performer insight to the music? One of those extraordinary recordings is the Richter/Kondrashin. There are others too. You wouldn't go wrong by buying this disc, but you wouldn't get a particularly interesting performance, comparatively-speaking, either.

Description of Liszt: Piano Concertos Nos.1 & 2; Totentanz

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