Moritz
Moszkowski: Piano Music, Volume Two.
Ian Hobson, piano. Toccata Classics. $18.99.
Copland:
Piano Sonata; Earl Wild: Seven Virtuoso Etudes after George Gershwin; Michael
Tilson Thomas: Upon Further Reflection.
John Wilson, piano. AVIE. $17.99.
Schoenberg:
Drei Klavierstücke, Op. 11;
Pierre Boulez: Troisième Sonate
pour Piano; Webern: Variationen für Klavier;
Gilbert Amy: Sonate pour Piano. James
W. Iman, piano. Métier. $18.99.
It has become fashionable among pianists and producers to search piano
literature for lost or merely misplaced gems. This tends to turn up some pieces
of value, although it is worth remembering that gems can be semi-precious as
well as precious. The early piano works of Moritz Moszkowski (1854-1925), a
second disc of which is now available with strongly committed performances by
Ian Hobson, fall into the “semi-precious” category. Certainly Moszkowski was a
capable craftsman, often a turner of elegant or at least pleasant pianistic phrases,
and himself a pianist of some note (so to speak). Nothing in his earlier
solo-piano music, however, rises much above a “salon” designation – which is
actually a perfectly acceptable musical form and venue, diminished only because
the piano and the best composers for it are capable of a great deal more. The
new Moszkowski recording from Toccata Classics includes three sets of modestly
conceived pieces that Moszkowski wrote in his 20s. These are not really suites
but simply collections of mostly unrelated works packaged together as single
opus numbers. Indeed, the most-substantial of the pieces, Drei Clavierstücke in
Tanzform, Op. 17, was originally
published as three individual works – although the three work well as a set.
These are virtuosic dance works, nicely varied as to mood – a polonaise, a
minuet, and a concert waltz. Only the polonaise has been recorded before, and
its many attitudinal changes are nicely displayed in Hobson’s reading. Hobson
also does a fine job with the other two pieces, which have interestingly
contrasted endings – pianissimo for
the minuet and quite dramatic for the waltz. There is less meatiness in the
other two collections of works heard here. Sechs
Stücke, Op. 15,
dating to 1877, opens with a Serenata
that is short, pleasant and rather unassuming, and is one of the few Moszkowski
piano pieces still heard in recital from time to time. It is the only one of
these six pieces to have been recorded in the past. The situation is much the
same for Fünf Clavierstücke, Op. 18
(1878): here, only the opening Melodie,
a pleasantly Schumannesque little work, has been recorded before. In both Op.
15 and Op. 18, there are elegant and well-planned touches of melody,
opportunities for pianists to show off a bit here and there, and a generally
light and pleasant musical flow throughout. Nothing here shows Moszkowski to
have been a major composer for solo piano, but nothing displeases the ear,
either, and Hobson does these works considerable credit by playing them with
straightforward eloquence that does not make them seem to be attempting to have
greater meaning or importance than they in fact possess.
The one world première recording among the three
works played by John Wilson on a new AVIE release is considerably more
substantial than anything on the Moszkowski CD. It is Upon Further Reflection by Michael Tilson Thomas (born 1944). Best
known as a conductor, Tilson Thomas shows in this suite that he is thoroughly versed
in pianism – he is, in fact, a fine pianist himself. Indeed, if anything, Tilson
Thomas is a little too well-versed in
the piano literature: Upon Further
Reflection quickly becomes a kind of “spot that tune” that incorporates
music by Schumann, Debussy, Berg, Monteverdi and others – and scarcely interpolates
from the classical field alone. There are hints of gamelan music and ragas
here, bits of various forms of pop and dance music, and more, all of it
free-flowing and intermittently enjoyable, but tending to sound a bit like the
reminiscences of a somewhat dispirited club pianist – think of Octavio at the
conclusion of Lehár’s Giuditta. The crepuscular mood is especially pronounced in the
second movement, Sunset Soliloquy,
which is longer than the other two movements combined. Wilson plays the piece
with considerable feeling and all the requisite technical skill, but the work
itself is less convincing than the performance: it is a kind of tour de force of references to and
development of music and motifs of the past, nicely packaged but
ultimately insufficiently convincing on its own to justify its 24-minute
duration. As it happens, that is the same length as Copland’s Piano Sonata, a piece that tends to
cause listeners who do not already know it to ask, “That’s Copland?” The work has nothing in common with the composer’s
much-better-known Americana, including his famous ballets. It is cast in
thoroughly modern style for its time (1939-1941), and is a predominantly
inward-looking work, its two outer movements marked Molto moderato and Andante
sostenuto (its middle and by far shortest movement is designated Vivace). The dissonance and rhythmic
hesitations and complexities are unsurprising for a work of this time period,
but they tend to come across as unexpected simply because the work is by Copland yet seems so far from his
other music. Really, it is not – it is simply another area of his interest –
but certainly the sonata, although popular with many pianists, is
understandably less so with listeners at large. Wilson handles the work’s
angularity and its emotional searching very well, although there is a degree of
pretension in the performance that can certainly be found in the music but that
does it little good when accentuated. It is Earl Wild’s Seven Virtuoso Etudes after George Gershwin that actually comes
across best in this recording. Wild was a pianist of very considerable ability,
and, like Tilson Thomas, a very musically adept one. But these etudes work
because Gershwin was such a marvelous tunesmith, and Wild builds the music on
what Gershwin originated – instead of trying to create a piece of his own with
echoes of other works. The fact that the individual etudes are fairly short
does not hurt, either: seven pieces in 21 minutes, each a small gem of melody
embellished as only a first-rate piano virtuoso, well aware of the capabilities
and limitations of his instrument, can embellish them. The tunes are mostly
quite recognizable: they are Liza,
Somebody Loves Me, The Man I Love, Embraceable You, Lady Be Good, I Got Rhythm,
and Fascinatin’ Rhythm. Wilson
seems to lighten up when playing this music, not seeking anything portentous
here but just letting the material flow in pleasant and engaging ways – but
different ones in each etude, which is why the music works so well as a whole
instead of seeming to be a disconnected series of smaller pieces. The very fine
pianism throughout this CD will be a pleasure for many listeners, but the
heavier and more intention-driven works do not come across as satisfactorily as
Wild’s grouping of varied and variegated ones.
The pianism is also top-notch on a new (+++) Métier CD featuring James W. Iman, but the musical collection here is somewhat off-putting, despite the skill with which Iman presents it. Iman is devoted almost entirely to music of the 20th century and 21st, focusing especially on serial and modernist works that, even 100 years after their composition, tend to come across more as dry mechanical productions rather than exercises in effective communication. They do communicate, to be sure, but while the Romantic era brought emotional communication, pieces such as the four on this disc are more in the realm of intellectual communication. That is, the abandonment of the emotive was largely by design – but that does not help make the pieces any more appealing than if their largely unemotional approach had been accidental. Schoenberg’s Op. 11 set of three pieces, dating to 1909, is an early example of his use of atonality and sounds considerably tamer than some of his later work or, for that matter, the other pieces on this CD. Iman gives the pieces an appropriately intense, brooding quality that stands them in good stead. Pierre Boulez’ Troisième Sonate pour Piano is a much later work (1955-57) that was never completed and has aleatoric elements. The movements Iman presents, Trope and Constellation-Miroir, are quite extended, lasting 24 minutes altogether, and suffer from a common modernist-music syndrome of being carefully created but sounding as if they were thrown together haphazardly. Webern’s 1936 Variationen für Klavier, on the other hand, show the meticulousness and miniaturization that are the composer’s hallmarks. The three movements last a total of eight minutes and have a kind of concise intensity that is engaging if not in any way emotionally moving. Finally, Iman offers a sonata by Gilbert Amy (born 1936, the year Webern’s work was composed). Dating to 1957, essentially the same time as Boulez’ Troisième Sonate pour Piano, Amy’s piece is in fact closely tied to the older composer: Amy created it under Boulez’ direction. The work is not imitative of Boulez and does not quite come across as any sort of homage – in fact, in its widely separated short notes and patterns of atonality, it resembles Webern more than Boulez. But Amy spins out his material at far greater length: the sonata lasts 25 minutes, which is more than enough. There is nothing especially compelling in it, or indeed in any of the other music on this CD, but it has to be said that Iman is a fierce and forceful advocate for the material and that he handles it with both understanding and technical skill. For those to whom material like this already appeals, this release will be very welcome indeed – but it will not be found particularly appealing by listeners who are not already committed to what Iman here puts on offer.
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