There is something rather lovely about this.
Category: recordings
Noteable releases: Trifonov/Babayan
I really wish that Daniil Trifonov and Henle or someone would do a deal and release his transcriptions. He has done some lovely work on Bach.
However, quite by chance, I found out about this yesterday. I asked myself, how good can it possibly be? Oh god, it’s amazing. I’m not really familiar with Sergei Babayan’s playing but I’m going to be frank, this album is approaching the recordings Trifonov did of the Rach concertos a few years ago and I wish he would record the cello sonata without a pesky cellist grabbing all the limelight.
In particular, I’d kill to have the sheets for the Symphonic Dances from this. It’s amazing.
This is one of those albums that has to be on your listen-list. I really would love to see them if they toured. This lad does things with a piano that very, very few other people can manage. I love listening to him play.
There are not enough superlatives in the world for this. The dynamic range is extraordinary; the pianos sound like god built instruments and the mics are disturbingly clear (this means one of them was singing along while playing). It’s the end of March. Debargue’s Fauré album is exquisite, and Tharaud’s duet album is also due in May and I expect wonderful things from that (the tasters are already gorgeous).
But I have a feeling this will be my piano album of the year.
New [to me] sheet music (3)
I found myself myself in a secondhand bookstore today looking at their sheet music collection. It was…disappointing in a way but exhilarating that two second hand bookshops in Brussels have sheet music. Today, you were quids in if you played the violin, the electric organ or the clarinet. Actually I assume that if you play the clarinet, it must be quite wonderful to fall over the odd bit of clarinet music anywhere, nevermind a shop more used to selling fiction and comic strips.
Anyway, times were thin on the piano music but I picked up two pieces, one being a duplicate (of more anon) and the other being by Guastavino whose music I had to order specially lately (I haven’t started the piece yet). He is not yet out of copyright but is difficultly in print. I’m not sure what this will be like but I bought it anyway.
What struck me about it was that each page was stamped with what looks like a publisher’s mark.
Anyway. I have it.
As a teenager, aside from Rach II, a couple of pieces of cinema music seared through my mind, one of which was Richard Adinsell’s Warsaw Concerto from the movie Dangerous Moonlight. As I mostly found classical music through figure skating at that time, I assume that’s where I picked that up from. Anyway, we found a recording, probably on Naxos at some point, but the sheet music eluded me for years and years and years and years. In fact, I only picked a new copy of it sometime in the last 2 years since Pointe d’Orgue became known to me (one of the two sheet music shops that I trust in Brussels. I ordered the Guastivino mentioned above from the other, Brauer. I know them both. Anyway, Pointe d’Orgue had the Adinsell so after a near 25 year search I had it in my hands.
One of the fascinating things for me with orchestral piano music is that you can get lots of it and it all has an accompaniment for a second piano or is a reduction for 2 pianos. So the Hummel I picked up last week was a bit of a novelty. Anyway, today’s haul includes Warsaw Concerto, or more specifically, Concerto de Varsovie, solo piano.
If you’re looking for a good recording of it, I’m inclined to suggest Jean Yves Thibaudet. You can have a listen on Youtube here.
Actually, I went looking for a trailer for the film Dangerous Moonlight which I have never seen and instead, I found this. The music is very clearly the star and yet, it’s completely different to any recording I have ever heard of it.
If you want to read more about the movie, you can find it here.
Anyway, they cost almost nothing. The total I spent in the shop was 5 euro 50 cents and in addition to the sheet music there was a kids book and a how to draw ballet dancers book.
When I got home I went to my “keep these safe” documents where I thought there was a copy of the piano solo of the Legend of the Glass Mountain by Nina Rota. Apparently I have put it somewhere even safer.
This is something I’ve been looking for almost as long; and I found a copy of it in the Sheet Music Library in the Central Library in Dublin about 30 years ago having searched for a while for it. No dice but I seemed to acquire a photocopy of it. I never got around to learning it but it’s still on my TBL list. I see a copy of it on eBay though which will post to Belgium so I am going to rectify that.
I’m interested in second hand sheet music sources. Point me at them.
Record Releases of Note: Igor Levit Fantasia
Igor Levit – Fantasia
This is absolutely worth your time if only to have a listen to the Liszt and the Bach. It is bright and clear and utterly inspiring.
Record releases of note this week
I don’t intend to turn this into a regular feature but two records dropped yesterday which are probably worth your time.
Goldberg Variations – Vikingur Olafson. Vikingur extracted a 5 star review from the Guardian for his last live performance of these in London which is quite an achievement. It’s worth catching his social media clips actually talking about this recording because he achieves something which other pianists don’t. He places the music in the context of dreaming and backs it up. Variations 7 and 9 so far stand out.
Chopin Etudes – Annique Goettler. Annique Goettler runs the YouTube channel Heart of the Keys which is one of my go tos for feeling part of a piano community online. She’s been working on this project for a long time, the launch concert was 6 October (last night per my writing date) and one noteworthy comment from one of her local papers was the pointer at how many young people attended that concert.