ADOLF WIKLUND: Piano Concerto No. 1 in E minor & No. 2 in B minor; Konsertstycke in C Major – Martin Sturfält, piano/ Helsingborg Sym. Orch./ Andrew Manze – Hyperion

ADOLF WIKLUND: Piano Concerto No. 1 in E minor & No. 2 in B minor; Konsertstycke in C Major – Martin Sturfält, piano/ Helsingborg Sym. Orch./ Andrew Manze – Hyperion CDA67828, 74:59 [Distr. by Harmonia mundi] *****:
This is, believe it or not, Volume 57 of Hyperion’s amazing Romantic Piano Concerto series of CDs. It just seems to go on forever, and each time those of us especially attracted to piano concertos find something at least worth hearing a few times.  This time, however, Hyperion has a real winner – a couple of big-hearted, tuneful and sweeping piano concertos which could enliven any concert program if brought back today from Swedish obscurity.
Wiklund, who lived until 1950, was extremely popular in his native Sweden until the idiot serialists drove such tonal romantic music as he wrote out of the concert halls. Both concertos combine the strong statements of Rachmaninoff with sweet melodies such as Grieg might pen. And the slow movement of the First Concerto exhibits a strong impressionistic bent, as Wiklund had been greatly impressed by Debussy’s opera Pelleas et Melisande before writing it.  He had studied with Busoni and Stenhammar, and the latter was a good friend of Wiklund’s. In general though, his style is more in the Germanic mode than anything else, and he is a good orchestrator. There’s little doubt from the opening of the First Concerto that we’re in for over a half-hour of a solid work of symphonic proportions.
The Second Piano Concerto is about six minutes shorter, with a more concise opening movement. Written a decade after the First, it is more refined, and consists of three movements but played without a break.  The second theme of its first movement seems to pay tribute to the composer’s friend Stenhammar, and his influence is heard elsewhere in the work. Wiklund’s Konsertstycke is inserted between the two piano concertos on the disc. This was his Opus 1, and though well-written is short of the fine melodies of the two concertos.
Pianist Sturfält specializes in performances of these Wiklund concerti in Sweden, and the recording was made in the Helsingborg Concert Hall in 2010. Sonics are about as good as one can get on standard CD, and to my ears these two concerti are a cut above other recent entries in the long-running series.
—John Sunier