Anderszewski Piano

Martha Argerich - Le Piano Roi (2014) [3CD Set] {Warner Classics}
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© 2014 Warner Classics | 08256 463188 2 7
Classical / Chamber Music / Piano

Who else in todays piano world could be associated with the concept of the master of piano? A definitive icon of contemporary piano performance, Martha Argerichs unique musical profile is illustrated by this 3-CD anthology that draws upon her 1965 Chopin recordings and her yearly chamber performances given in Lugano. Featuring outstanding musical partners including Renaud Capuçon, Nelson Freire, Gidon Kremer, Maria-João Pires, Gautier Capuçon, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Charles Dutoit, and Daniel Barenboim, this 3-CD set presents outstanding mastery on all fronts. CD Listing: CD 1: Concertos CD 2: Musique de Chambre CD 3: Piano Solo.

The release of any recording by the pianist Piotr Anderszewski constitutes something of a special occasion. As the Scottish newspaper The Herald wrote: “In music as in life, Anderszewski is a man who takes his decision-making seriously. His recitals are intense and wonderful: he is a profound communicator, a meticulous craftsman, a deeply original interpreter. He infuses every gesture with tremendous care; no phrase is thrown away, no nuance without meaning. The process of putting together such acutely considered performances is painstaking and lengthy … which goes some way to explaining why his repertoire includes just a handful of core composers.”

The release of any recording by the pianist Piotr Anderszewski constitutes something of a special occasion. As the Scottish newspaper The Herald wrote: “In music as in life, Anderszewski is a man who takes his decision-making seriously. His recitals are intense and wonderful: he is a profound communicator, a meticulous craftsman, a deeply original interpreter. He infuses every gesture with tremendous care; no phrase is thrown away, no nuance without meaning. The process of putting together such acutely considered performances is painstaking and lengthy … which goes some way to explaining why his repertoire includes just a handful of core composers.”

The highly personal and often chimerical piano music of Robert Schumann requires a confident interpreter who can enter the music with full awareness of the composer's quirks, yet not become so involved with their strangeness that he gets lost. For this Virgin release, the brilliant Piotr Anderszewski has chosen two works that show the extremes of Schumann's divided personality: the youthful and playful Humoresque, Op. 20, and the late, madness-tinged Morning Songs, Op. 133. In between them is the sober set of Studies for the Pedal Piano, Op. 56, which, in its serious counterpoint and controlled expressions, stands apart from Schumann's wild mood swings and emotionally turbulent music. Because these three works are seldom performed and are open to fresh possibilities, Anderszewski has free reign to explore the whimsy and sorrow of the Humoresque, the intellectuality of the Studies, and the brooding of the Morning Songs, and the range of his comprehension and expression is wide indeed.

This is a glorious disc. Simply glorious. Anderszewski and Bach have long been congenial bedfellows and the Pole’s playing here is compelling on many different levels. To start with, there’s the sense of sharing the sheer physical thrill of Bach’s keyboard-writing. This is particularly evident in faster movements such as the fierce and brilliant fugal Gigue that concludes the Third Suite, or, in the E minor Fifth Suite, the extended fugal Prelude and the outer sections of its Passepied I. Common to all is a sense of being fleet but never breathless, with time enough for textures to tell.

Piotr Anderszewski and the Belcea Quartet make superb partners in one of Shostakovich’s most performed chamber works. They present the powerful and highly approachable Piano Quintet with playing of colossal tensile strength, a tightly focused sound and yet with a willingness to respond to the work’s undeniable lyricism. The work’s rigour is striking when performed with this kind of intensity and concentration. The Third Quartet (1946) remains one of Shostakovich’s finest—and one of his favourites, perhaps because it responds so powerfully to the combustible events of the time. The Belceas capture its sardonic, sometimes violent, mood to perfection.

Another example of superb programming, Piotr Anderszewski's Chopin recital on Virgin is brilliantly conceived and masterfully executed. Concentrating on the compoer's late works, Anderszewski's program starts with two sets of Mazurkas played with supple sensitivity and sympathetic poetry, builds through the last two Ballades played with dramatic intensity and terrific technique, climaxes in the last two Polonaises played with heroic grandeur and tremendous virtuosity, and closes with the tender and intimate Mazurka in F minor as an encore. Anderszewski's technique is imperious, his tone is sensual, his performances are emotional, and his interpretations are magisterial. Individually, each performance is strong and vital. Taken all together, the whole disc is more than the sum of its parts. Virgin's sound is warm but a bit close and sometimes a little too immediate.