Dinu Lipatti: Last Recital at Besancon = BACH: Partita No. 1 in B-flat Major, BWV 825; MOZART: Piano Sonata No. 8 in A Minor, K. 310; SCHUBERT: Impromptu No 3 in G-flat Major, D. 899, No. 3; Impromptu No. 2 in E-flat Major, D. 899, No. 2; CHOPIN: 13 Waltzes – Dinu Lipatti, piano
Opus Kura OPK 7056, 72:00 [Distr. by Albany] ****:
Dinu Lipatti (1917-1950) last appeared in public recital 16 September 1950 at Besancon, a concert that might have been denied all humanity, given Lipatti’s frail state of health. A brilliant Romanian virtuoso schooled by Boulanger and Cortot, Lipatti was diagnosed with leukemia in 1945, and his condition thereafter took its toll on his physical stamina. Cortisone treatments provided some relief, although their long-term effects became apparent after a few years. Feeling ill the afternoon of the recital, Lipatti thought to cancel. When Lipatti heard that the recital hall for his projected 1950 concert for select friends and music lovers had a full house, however, he insisted he must play. “For him, the concert was a pledge to his Love for Music,” declared wife Madeleine. The pianist literally hobbled to the keyboard, having decided he would not leave the instrument between pieces. The audience, seated completely around him, maintained a religious silence until the end of each piece, when it burst into raptures.|
The original 1957 EMI release (Angel B 3556) edited out Lipatti’s “testing” of the keyboard before several pieces, playing a brief scale prior to the Bach that at first collapses after the fourth note. Opus Kura maintains the original scales, rescued by a filmed portion of the recital from producer Philippe Roger. But despite an occasional weakness of attack–and these are slight–the Lipatti magic “softness through strength” remains intact, often with startling clarity of articulation. Those who know his recording of the Ravel Alborada del gracioso revere a perfect specimen of miraculous bravura. The Bach Partita in B-flat ravishes us with éclat and pearly grace, the level of concentration quite palpable. The Mozart enjoys a steely patina but limpid with fluid figurations, a hallmark of Lipatti as well as Michelangeli. The vocal-operatic drama never succumbs to sentimentality, nor does Mozart devolve into a rococo practitioner of florid rhetoric. The two Schubert impromptus find their perfect advocate in Lipatti, noble, intimate, diaphanous yet ground in those bass harmonies that make Schubert a delver into the dark places. The even sway of Lipatti’s running figures in the E-flat proves more startling than the supreme cantilena of the G-flat Major. What we would give for a set of Lipatti’s complete Chopin Etudes!
The waltz sequence from Chopin remains remarkable for dexterity and dragonfly abandon. From the opening Op. 42 two/four waltz, we are mesmerized by a fluency whose breathtaking accuracy never intrudes on the inner pulsation of the concept. The sense of Chopin style, the inflection, whether in slow or brilliantly quick time, sustains a poignancy quite extraordinary. The brisk fingers find an equal acumen in the intelligence behind them. The broken style of the G-flat Major, Op. 70, No. 1 seems more etude than waltz, but Lipatti allows it to dance in plastic nostalgia. Has the posthumous E Minor ever received such an eddy, a vaporous tempest? The F Major, Op. 34, No. 1 throws off a mischievous scintillation that few would dare attempt. For my taste, Lipatti takes the F Minor, Op. 70, No. 2 a mite too quickly, but its inner voices and cascading arpeggios receive every degree of intelligent wistfulness. It only occurs in the last page of Op. 64, No. 3 that the body fails the will. Still, Lipatti recovers for a virile E-flat Major, Op. 18, as flamboyant as it is impulsive. Only one waltz remains–the A-flat Major, Op. 34, No. 3–but it was not to be. Lipatti left the stage–only to return to play the Myra Hess transcription of the Jesu, Joy of Man’ Desiring–of which no recording has ever survived. But what we do possess testifies to the tone of those unearthly spirits who for a brief time played music in this world.
— Gary Lemco
