BRAHMS: Piano Concerto No. 1 in D Minor, Op. 15; R. STRAUSS: Burleske in D Minor, Op. 11 – Joshua Pierce, piano/Slovak Philharmonic Orchestra/Czech National Symphony Orchestra (Strauss)/Paul Freeman
MSR Classics MS 1346, 65:00 [Distr. by Albany] ****:
Joshua Pierce and conductor Paul Freeman present a Brahms D Minor Concerto (1858) given at the Reduta (24 June 1993) in Bratislava, formerly Pressburg, during the so-called Velvet Revolution, some three years after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the beginning of the dissolution of the Communist and Socialist regimes in Eastern Europe. Pierce plays the surly and tempestuous first movement as a dialogue between competing impulses in D Minor, D Major and F Major, an explosive outburst of sturm und drang versus a countermelody in the form of a hymn, espessivo. The hammer blows of fate seem to be pitted against nostalgic visions of lost hopes. Both Pierce and Freeman seem committed to making the development section of the movement with its ineluctable return via E Major over a pedal D as the climactic moment of the drama. The sonic balances between Pierce and often shrieking orchestral part are maintained by Otto Napp. The tympanist in this concerto as well as in the Strauss Burleske –with the Czech National Symphony –expends a full workout that makes a lasting impression.
The second movement in 6/4 and D Major gravitates to the distant key of F-sharp Minor, which might be an homage to the slow movement of Mozart’s Concerto No. 23. The brooding calm, made of scales and held notes, evolves into a chromatic fantasy that Brahms seems to have meant for elements of his German Requiem. The woodwind and French horn choirs of the Slovak Philharmonic prove especially pungent as much as the string choirs remain elegiac. Pierce’s upper registers glisten with pearly clarity, and his trills ring with exuberant energy. And so to the 2/4 gypsy rondo last movement, with its roots simultaneously in the bravura tradition of Beethoven and Haydn and the contrapuntal efforts of the Bach inventions and partitas, especially the orchestral fugato in B-flat Minor. The constant surges of staccato figures in the left hand opposed to legato periods in the right come as no dire challenge to Pierce, who negotiates the manic changes of meter and affect with stately aplomb. Even with the severe classical strictures imposed upon the seething passions in this music, Pierce and Freeman manage to infuse a sense of emotional abandon into the mix, a truly superheated effort appropriate to the occasion of the concert.
The big Scherzo (1886; rev. 1889) in D Minor by Strauss, his Burleske, like the Brahms concerto, has all traits of a symphonic movement with piano obbligato. The tuned tympani prove as dazzling in their effects as the chromatic runs and wild leaps of the piano part, whose figures glide from ¾ to 6/4 with the same swagger as we find in virtuoso Chopin. Embedded into the cascading mix are “improvised ” waltz rhythms and echoes of Alt Wien. The skittish play of eighth and sixteenth notes often points to the irreverence of Till Eulenspiegel. While the interplay between Piece and Freeman has bold colors and feline grace, I find the performance a tad academic, at least compared to the wilder treatments from Rudolf Serkin, Glenn Gould, and Byron Janis. This, however, does not deny the colossal sense of scope this collaboration projects, its audacity of a young composer relishing in his potent skills in bravura keyboard figuration and orchestral polyphony. The touches of Lisztian sarcasm and devilish leggiero transparency that infiltrate the score–and even the humor of a bassoon’s comments against the piano’s legato–often expand and achieve a yearning spaciousness close to Mahler. The wayward rhythmic play more than not convinces me that Gershwin knew this piece and kept its aural image in mind for his Concerto in F. Much fun and bravura in this disc, given the relative frequency of the two scores as standards among record collectors.
–Gary Lemco
