Ginastera: Piano Sonata nr. 1 - Ravel: Gaspard de la nuit - Brahms: 3 Intermezzi - Beethoven: 32 Variations - Constantinescu: Joc Dobrogean

I've been listening quite often to his CD over the last couple of weeks, maybe even months. I have been seeking out performances by the young Romanian pianist Mihaela Ursuleasa since I heard her take, in partnership with Patricia Kopatchinskaja, on Enescu's wonderful Violin Sonata nr. 3. This recital did not disappoint my expectations. It's an epic affair that starts with Beethoven's rowdy C minor variations (WoO 80), then moves to late Brahms's introvert Intermezzi op. 117 as a base camp to tackle the Everest of Ravel's scintillating Gaspard de la nuit. Ursuleasa ups the ante with Ginastera's fabulously kinetic Piano Sonata nr. 1, op. 22 and finally closes with a white hot encore in the Romanian style. All in all a tremendous achievement for a pianist in her early 30s. The recital is composed as a personal narrative in which each piece is associated to life stations or key relationships of the performer. For Ursuleasa, the Ginastera sonata conjures up the image of her father, a jazz pianist. The Beethoven variations she played already at the age of 10. Brahms she discovered and fell in love with when she took up studies in Vienna. In relation to Gaspard she reminisces about the fairy tales that coloured her earliest years. And the Constantinescu toccata is inextricably linked to her South-Eastern European roots. In all these pieces Mihaela Ursuleasa displays a gripping, muscular virtuosity, supported by a keen sense of architecture and an appealing clarity of contour. For me the highlight on this disc is most certainly the Ginastera sonata. Sure, it may not plumb the existential depths of the Brahms Intermezzi, but it reveals a very accomplished composer with, say, the fire and dash of the young Prokofiev. The opening Allegro marcato is a rambunctious dance as they also feature prominently in his symphonic ballets. The ensuing Presto misterioso is a wonderfully atmospheric, shadowy movement played almost pianissimo throughout. Then follows an expansive, nocturnal Adagio molto appassionato. It opens with a mysterious theme quite extraordinaly played, it seems, by directly plucking the strings of the piano. A beautiful movement, accesible and modernistic. The finale - Ruvido ed ostinato - is a predictable return to Ginastera's most obsessively kinetic mood. Party time, indeed! All in all a great CD to which I will often return.

Haydn: String Quartet op. 64/5 - Janacek: String Quartet nr. 2 - Ravel: String Quartet

Yesterday it was Takacs Quartet's turn to perform at the Brussels Conservatoire. A splendid programme: Haydn's Lark Quartet, Janacek's Intimate Letters, and Ravel's masterpiece. The hall was full but the audience was dead silent. Yet again, and significantly more so than with the Haas Quartet, I was unable to stay with the music. I found the Takacs' playing less than compelling. There was a unfocused quality, a diffusion of energy that made the music sound muffled and uninvolving. The Haydn quartet was performed very leisurely, giving the impression of a laid-back rehearsal session. Pleasant, but hardly captivating. Janacek's quartet was a disappointment. I love the music, but this reading struck me as disjointed and contrived. Already the sul ponticello effects at the very outset of the piece annoyed me, as if what I heard was something fake, not the real thing. I lost interest somewhere halfway down the road. I drew most satisfaction from the Ravel, which received a solid and, yes, perhaps even good performance. All in all a not very memorable evening. I didn't wait for the encore.

Ravel: Piano Concerto in G

Ravel's urbane and sophisticated Piano Concerto in G (1929-1931) is a little too polished for its own good, I find. It's always nice to listen to but beyond that it leaves me rather cold.

And that didn't change with this little comparative audition of the three versions - two on vinyl and one on CD - I have in my collection. I started with a 1968 recording featuring Werner Haas as a soloist, accompanied by the Orchestre Nationale de l'Opéra de Monte Carlo under Alceo Galliera (an Italian conductor unbeknownst to me who was long associated with La Scala; Abbado allegedly was one of his students). I thought the first movement started a bit scrappily but quickly the performance takes flight. The dreamily, 'mystical' part in development section was very well done and provided a contemplative center of gravity in this otherwise bustling movement. The slow movement was fine: soberly aristocratic and eschewing emotional mannerisms. A satisfying finale brought the work to an end. I thought this was an excellent recording.

Then the 1958 recording by Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli with the Philharmonia Orchestra under Ettore Gracis (a Fenice stalwart who was almost a perfect contemporary of Galliera). For many this is the version to have. Sadly my vinyl copy was a little worn out so that it didn't quite do justice to the impeccable artistry on display. The big difference with the Haas recording, it seems to me, is the slow movement where ABM conjures up the most gossamer textures, superbly accompanied by the Philharmonia. However, I found the Haas to be more earthy and interesting in the outer movements.

I ended with an old favourite of mine, featuring the mature Alicia de Larrocha supported by the London Philharmonic with Lawrence Foster at the helm. It's a Decca recording for which she received a Grammy in 1975. I pasted the cover of the London LP edition (which I don't have) in this blog message because I like the black-and-white picture so much. Now I must say that compared to the previous two versions I found this recording a little wanting. It doesn't quite muster the distinguished manners of Haas' rendition or the transcendent qualities of Benedetti Michelangeli's quest for the last ounce of nuance. It's a more female and suave and ultimately also more anecdotal reading. In the slow movement Foster risks to spill over into the larmoyant. Technically it's a fabulous recording that puts Ravel's mastery of the orchestra very well on display.

Ravel: Alborada del gracioso, La Valse - Debussy: Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faun, Nocturnes

I have some catching up to do. Trouble is I'm getting so circumspect in writing about my listening impressions that it takes ages to get it down on paper. Mr. Debussy himself has turned into a sirene that is hypnotising me! These days I'm obsessed by music, although I have precious little time to listen. But it's all whirling around in my head. In an ideal world I could start to listen and read and ponder and hypothesise for days or weeks on end. I've been reading up on Debussy and the more I learn the deeper the fascination gets. But I can't. I don't have the time. Professional obligations are eating me up. So I am staying hungry.

Yesterday I listened to two pieces by Ravel. Superb recordings by Karajan and the Orchestre de Paris, back in 1971, which were buried in that gargantuan EMI collection that appeared just a few years ago on the occasion of the maestro's 100th birthday. La Valse is gorgeous, with orchestral textures smooth as silk and hard as a bone, a mesmerising whirlpool of velvety shadows and blazes of light, collapsing in an appropriately manic finale. The Alborado is very fine too, delicate, even understated, with again those blinding flashes when Karajan whips up the tutti into a frenzy. The recordings captured in the Salle Wagram are full-bodied and clear as a bell.

Then back to Debussy. Van Beinum's Nocturnes with the Concertgebouw Orchestra are the finest I have heard up to now. Particularly the Nuages are captivating with such a delicacy and expressiveness in the phrasing; a most translucent sfumato is envelopping the music. No idea how they did it. The Fêtes is very accomplished but blends more into mainstream interpretations. The fanfare, however, is most beautifully done, with the trumpets positioned at just the right distance. The Sirènes then are extraordinary, as skittishly seductive as you will find them. All in all a beautiful reading. I look forward to La Mer (stereo) and the Images (mono) on the same disc (from the Australian Eloquence series).

I have been listening to the Prélude too: 6 versions and counting. I can't say there has been a really bad experience amongst them. I love Paul Paray with the 1950s Detroit SO (on LP). A quick and tempestuous reading that looks ahead at the marine expanses of La Mer. But timingwise (it clocks in at just over 8 minutes) it is very much in the spirit of the classic recordings by conductors who were Debussy's contemporaries: Monteux, Gui, Pierné and Ingelbreght. All of them hover between 8 and just over 9 minutes. Compare this to Haitink and Tilson Thomas who are a full 2 to 3 minutes slower! Haitink's reading is majestic and, though slow, superbly paced. MTT is good but sounds more anecdotal to me. Karajan (with the Berlin PO, 1977, on EMI) is maybe the most architectural of all. He seems to shape the archlike movement most convincingly. Then there is Jean Martinon with the ORTF Orchestra (on LP) taped in the mid-1970s: a very disciplined and taut reading that seems to connect with the spirit of Paray and the classics. Finally another athletic approach from Saraste with the Rotterdam PO which I thought was one of the lesser inspiring.

It's amazing how approachable this music is and yet, when you start to look up some analyses, it appears that nobody is able to explain how it really works. In it's bare 10 minutes (upon which Debussy spent almost a year's work) the composer throws a most intricate puzzle in the face of musicologists, an organically morphing mosaic of themes and harmonic building blocks that eludes formal analysis.

Beethoven: Sonata for Violin and Piano nr. 9 'Kreutzer' - Ravel: Sonata for Violin and Piano - Say: Sonata for Violin and Piano - Bartok: Romanian Folk Dances

I still have to report a live concert we attended Tuesday last week. Patricia Kopatchinskaja (violin) and Fazil Say (piano) came to Leuven with an interesting programme. I was particularly attracted by Prokofiev's epic First Violin Sonata but, to my considerable disappointment, the performance was cancelled at the last moment and the Beethoven Kreutzer Sonata came instead. But I guess that's part of the game when you want to hear and see these two 'enfants terribles' at work. Both Say and Kopatchinskaja have a reputation for waywardness. Their podium presence certainly confirms this. Kopatchinskaja plays barefeet. Say sways ecstatically behind his piano. Both bring visceral energy to their performance (the difference with the poised Ibragimova/Tiberghien duo I heard recently in Brussels is striking). But despite the fact that they must have performed this particular programme innumerable times (it already featured on their debut CD in 2008), the joint music making still sounded fresh and engaging. The Beethoven sonata did not disappoint. There was an electrifying sense of drama, particularly in the stormy outer movements, that for me threw a new light on this work. The middle Andante was slightly less successful. There it struck me that Kopatchinskaja's tonal palette seemed rather restricted, but that impression can also be due to the relatively poor acoustics of a large, new teaching auditorium. After the break came Say's own piece: an eclectic and derivative work that I forgot as soon as I had heard it. In Bartok's Romanian Folk Dances (an adaptation of the piano original by Zoltan Szekely) Kopatchinskaja could play out her eastern European pedigree to the brink. The music might as well have sounded on a dusty Moldovan village square a hundred years ago. The programme was brought to an end by a masculine and colourful rendition of the Ravel sonata. Some quirky encores (which certainly underscored the virtuoso capabilities of the duo) concluded an engaging musical evening. I must admit at being slightly skeptical when I went in, but I was won over by the ostensible honesty and musicality of what was offered. Kopatchinskaja's rough and visceral approach might smack of cheap sensationalism (and in this promo video it really goes over the top) but what I heard last week struck me as staying within the bounds of good taste and genuine musicality. 

Debussy: Jeux - Ravel: Rhapsodie Espagnole

Some more late Debussy with Jeux, his last and also what is generally regarded his most accomplished and enigmatic orchestral score. Originally written as 'poème dansé' for the Ballets Russes, it was premiered in 1913 by Pierre Monteux and then largely forgotten, supposedly because of its banal scenario (a boy and two girls frolic in a garden at dusk; their game is interrupted by a stray tennis ball). De Sabata recorded it for the first time in 1947 (apparently still available at Testament) and in the 1950s it started to be taken up by a number of francophone conductors (Cluytens, Ansermet, Munch, and again Monteux).

Allegedly Debussy did not like the ballet's plot, but he was ill with cancer and in debt and Dhiagilev paid him 10.000 gold francs to write the score. All of the 700 bars of Jeux were written in just a matter of three weeks in August 1913. Maybe the speed of writing helps to explain the very particular character of this piece. It is as fellow-composer Kevin Volans once wrote about how painter Philip Guston inspired him by his way of working: " ... in an effort to get away from form and into the material, he stood close up to the canvas, working quickly and not stepping back to look until the work was finished." Reflecting on his own quartet The Songlines Volans writes: "I juxtaposed very different kinds of music in the order they occured to me, not thinking ahead, and allowing the material to unfold at its own pace. If there was a 'sense of form' at work, it was covert. However, I didn't use everything that occured to me. I tried to follow Guston's suggestion of 'eliminating both that which is yours already and that which is not yet yours' - in other words, keeping only that which is becoming yours."

I feel this perfectly captures the kaleidoscopic nature of this score in which there are 60 tempo markings and in which myriads of one or two bar motives have been identified. Personally I find it a rather frigid beauty that appeals more to the intellect than to the heart. I listened to three different versions of the work: Tilson Thomas with the London SO, Boulez with the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie (part of their 3CD Jubiläums Edition) and the celebrated Haitink with the Concertgebouw Orchestra. All of them seemed to have an excellent measure of the score, with MTT infusing the music with a characteristically impressionistic sfumato (helped by an atmospheric recording from the Abbey Road Studios), and Boulez, predictably, betting everything on precision and transparency. Haitink is sitting somewhere in between. Despite the qualities of these recordings I have the feeling that there is more to this score.

The CD with the Boulez take on Jeux also includes a 1980 performance by the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie of Ravel's Rhapsodie Espagnole, this time conducted by Kyrill Kondrashin. I've known the Rhapsodie for a very long time (my dad bought a recording in the earliest days of the compact disc medium, Eduardo Mata with the Dallas SO on RCA) considering it as one of these superbly crafted but innocuous symphonic spectaculars. But this performance is of a totally different calibre than anything else I have heard of this piece. It sounds raucously contemporary (I thought it was a later piece than the Debussy Jeux but was surprised to see Ravel composed it in 1907-08 already) and conjures the kind of cataclysmic images that would flower in La Valse only fifteen years and a world war later. The recording, that was made of a live performance, is astonishingly detailed if only a little constricted in the very loudest tutti. Kondrashin and his young orchestra present the work as if every detail has been thought through, yet the music making has an athletic, feline quality that is totally appropriate. It's a spooky, monumental version of the piece that perfectly seems to capture the atmosphere of these heady days early in the previous century.

Debussy: Violin Sonata - Lekeu: Violin Sonata - Ravel: Violin Sonata, Tzigane - Szymanovsky: Mythes

On Wednesday I had the pleasure to accompany an American guest to a concert. Violinist Alina Ibragimova gave a recital, accompanied by Cédric Tiberghien on the piano, at the Brussels Conservatory. I hadn't really heard about Ibragimova but I was attracted by an interesting programme and I was also intrigued by the fine discography that, despite her young age, she has behind her name (including the Hartmann Concerto Funèbre on Hyperion). Furthermore, it has been many years since I have attended a performance at the Conservatory hall. As I have always enjoyed this rather quaint and slightly down at heel venue for its intimate atmosphere and excellent acoustics I was eager revisit it.

Ibragimova is incredibly petite and delicate for her age - she looks 16 rather than 25 - but she coaxes an authoritative, unfussy tone from her instrument that strikes a nice balance between warmth and cleanliness. I was surprised by how nicely the sound seemed to fill the smallest nooks of the concert hall. But what is even more impressive is Ibragimova's musical intelligence. With the elusive Debussy and the fantastic Szymanovsky, this was technically and interpretatively an intimidating programme. But both musicians seemed to rise effortlessly to the challenge. The concert started with the Debussy sonata. This was a very lucky coincidence, as I had just discovered the incredible Cello Sonata. The Violin Sonata was the last work the Debussy completed, in 1917. A balanced and concise three-movement composition, it fits very well in the mould of its sister work. Again, Debussy's supreme command of the medium strikes from the very first, quizzical bars onwards. The work oscillates between melancholy and a clenched-teeth kind of defiance. Underneath one intimates a deep sense of loss. As with the Cello Sonata, there is freedom and density, discipline and complexity. It speaks of deep wisdom and masterly craft. How striking that a 25-year old musician is able to capture and project these multi-dimensional complexities.

The Lekeu sonata is a work I used to listen to fairly often in a very early phase of my musical explorations. But it hasn't reappeared on my playlist for decades. As a composer Verviers-born Lekeu was one of Belgium's greatest promises. He wrote his admirable sonata when he was in early twenties, just a few years before his untimely death at age 24 in 1894 (from typhoid fever). The sonata is grand work, about half an hour long. It's passionately lyrical and more 'narrative', more easy to follow than the compact, mysterious Debussy sonata. I need to make sure to add this to my collection.

The Szymanovsky Mythes, op. 30, I have heard in the past (in the version with Zimerman at the piano), but they were not very familiar. These three tone poems for piano and violin sound extraordinarily sophisticated and fiendishly difficult to play. It's another work I do not have in my collection and that I urgently need to re-investigate.

Finally, the Ravel is another great sonata, urbane and refined, and a fitting conclusion to a quite marvelous recital. The textures are more translucent and less dense compared to the Debussy but there is a certain contrariness due to the two voices in this work sometimes veering off in quite different directions. As an encore we were treated to an astonishing feat of white hot virtuosity with a scorching Tzigane. Ibragimova and her partner certainly showed their mettle. An additional fact that contributed to the listening pleasure was the fact that the audience in the Conservatory hall was extremely silent during the performance. Even between breaks one couldn't hear as much as a sigh. 

Since the recital I have listened a couple of times to the Debussy sonata in a performance by Dutch violinist Liza Ferschtman (part of a 2CD Brilliant collection of various works for violin and piano). Also Ferschtman seems to have an excellent grasp of this complex work. Very striking are the flute-like effects she produces in the slow, introspective middle section of the sonata's first movement.

Of the Ravel sonata I have only a version by Chantal Juillet (a Canadian violinist married to conductor Charles Dutoit) accompanied by Pascal Rogé. I must say that compared to the live performance I heard in Brussels it sounds rather bland and unimaginative (despite it having a won a Gramophone award at the time). Also the Tzigane comes nowhere near what Ibragimova/Tiberghien treated us on. So I need to make sure I get their Hyperion disc with the Ravel and Lekeu sonatas.