August Piano

August Winding was the son of a musical clergyman whose great interest was in collecting folk-songs. He was his son's first music teacher. Later, he studied in Hamburg, Vienna and Paris where he became acquainted with Chopin and Kalkbrenner. The composer Carl Reinecke, who was court composer in Copenhagen in 1846-48, also taught Winding. He was very close to Niels W. Gade and also studied with him. He established himself as a formidable pianist especially in the works of Mozart and Beethoven. He taught at the Conservatory in Copenhagen and through his marriage to Clara, the daughter of J.P.E. Hartmann, he became a member of this musical family. In fact, the other composer on this CD, Emil Hartmann was his brother-in-law.

Wilhelm Kempff was a master of poetic lyricism, with a wondrous keyboard touch and a breathtaking command of subtle dynamics and tonal colorations–all invaluable attributes of any Schubert interpreter. He also had the knack of holding together large structures that can often seem aimless, thus avoiding another trap many pianists fall into, that of lavishing so much attention on passing detail that Schubert's "heavenly lengths" can seem wayward wanderings. The one criticism often heard is that Kempff emphasizes poetry at the expense of drama. This magnificent set leaves that claim unsubstantiated.

Period-instrument performances of Beethoven's violin sonatas aren't too common; they pose thorny problems of balance even beyond the question of whether Beethoven wouldn't have preferred modern instruments if he could have had them. But this superbly musical set by violinist Midori Seiler, playing an Italian Baroque violin of unknown manufacture, and fortepianist Jos van Immerseel, on a copy of an entirely appropriate Viennese Walter piano, may well redefine the standard for these works.

The Portuguese pianist Maria Joa?o Pires has long been associated with the music of Mozart. Her delicacy of touch, vibrancy of phrasing and sense of fantasy mark her out as one of the elect who can touch his keyboard music without coarsening or sim- plifying it. She has made two complete cycles of the sonatas; reissued here is the first one, from the days in the 1970s when she first appeared on the international scene and won over listeners with a graceful purity of approach that left more famous names trailing in her wake.The later cycle brought added refinement, but anyone who is captivated by this still undervalued corpus – too difficult for beginners, yet scorned by many professionals in search of gaudier glories – will want to hear this set.

Deep thought, care and love pervade this newest contribution to Arrau's Schumann cycle, just as they did all the others. The discovery for me was the Blumenstück, which if played at all (it isn't often) so easily emerges like some pretty but pale little drawing-room aquarelle. But not from Arrau. Characteristically, he reads between the lines of every bar, and discovers as much to express as in any of Schumann's wholly introspective pieces. I was amazed at the variety of mood he extracts from the work's not greatly varied figuration throughout the sequence of brief, closely related sections.

If you're already a fan of Russian music of the Imperial Age, you already know at least the name Mily Balakirev, the living link between Glinka, the father of Russian music, and Mussorgsky, Borodin, and Rimsky-Korsakov, the composer who sacrificed much of his composing time to his pupils and part of his life to his insanity, but who nevertheless turned out indubitable masterpieces in several genres. The First Symphony and the symphonic poem Tamara are probably his best-known orchestral works, but his best-known single work in any genre is certainly his Islamy, the piece of pseudo-ethnic, super-virtuoso sex-dance music that Russian pianists still occasionally trot out as an encore.

Although Claudio Arrau had impressive credentials as a Liszt player - his only teacher was Martin Krause, who was a student of Liszt - and he performed many of the composer's works early in his career, he neither exploited this association, nor became known as a Liszt specialist. Perhaps this was because Krause warned him not to become a specialist in the music of any one composer, urging him instead to embrace all music. Consequently, the younger Arrau's repertoire was very large; however, as he grew older he concentrated on fewer composers, moving as it were from the universal to the particular applying almost prophetic insight into certain scores, especially those of Beethoven and Liszt.

For many listeners, the keyboard works of Gabriel Fauré epitomize French music of the fin de siècle, typically because its languorous melodies and subtle harmonies are at times evocative of late Romantic parlor music. Yet Angela Hewitt defends Fauré's piano music from such a superficial judgment, demonstrating that it is much more substantial in content than the conventional piano pieces of the time, and that the difficulties one encounters in his music are akin to the complexities in Bach. Hewitt's polished performances of the Thème et variations, two Valses-caprices, three Nocturnes, and the Ballade are proof of her longtime commitment to this music, and her penetrating insights into Fauré's expressions and technical artistry reveal levels of inventiveness that are often missed in less competent performances. Of course, having played Fauré for most of her life, Hewitt has intimate knowledge of the music, and her sensitivity and control communicate precisely the effects she wishes, so the music never seems sloppily sentimental or vaguely sketched.

Hungarian pianist Annie Fischer made her debut at the age of 10 and studied with Ernst von Dohnányi at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music. Her performance of the Liszt Sonata in B minor won Fischer first prize at the 1933 Liszt International Piano Competition, but her concert career was barely underway when war broke out; Fischer fled to Sweden. Afterwards Fischer returned to Hungary, and although she made her New York debut in 1961, she was only seldom seen in the United States and based her career in continental Europe.

Apart from Grieg, no Scandinavian composer has written for the piano with more individuality and insight than Nielsen. Right from the very outset of his Five Piano Pieces, Op. 3, there is no doubt that his is an individual voice. The first emerges from a Schumannesque innocence to speak with personal accents, but all five are strong on humour and character. Nielsen’s greatest piano music is clustered into a period of four years (1916-20) with his final thoughts in the medium, the Three Pieces, Op. 59 of 1928 being composed in the immediate proximity of his Clarinet Concerto, music that already breathes the air of other planets. With the exception of Leif Ove Andsnes, no pianist of international standing has championed it on record, and apart from John Ogdon and John McCabe it has been the almost exclusive preserve of Nordic artists. True, the American scholar Mina Miller, who edited the autographs for the Hansen edition, recorded a complete survey in 1995 – also for Hyperion. But although Schnabel was the dedicatee of the Suite, Op. 45, he never broke a lance for it on the international scene. The Suite is not only Nielsen’s greatest keyboard work but arguably the mightiest ever written in Scandinavia. Martin Roscoe is right inside this music and guides us through its marvels with great subtlety and authority.