Menahem Pressler, Vol. I = MENDELSSOHN: Piano Concerto No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25; Sextet for Piano, Violin, 2 Violas, and Doublebass, Op. 110; Six Children’s Pieces, Op. 72; Variations serieuses in D Minor, Op. 54; Rondo Capriccioso in E Major, Op. 14 – Menahem Pressler, piano/Vienna State Opera Orchestra/Hans Swarowsky/Guilet String Quartet/Philip Sklar, double bass/Nathan Gordon, viola
Doremi DHR-7889, 79:12 [Distr. by Allegro] ****:
Veteran piano virtuoso Menahem Pressler (b. 1923) receives tribute from Doremi, which here restores–for the Mendelssohn bi-centennial–his various recordings of that composer’s work, made for the MGM label, 1950-1953. Although known almost exclusively as a chamber music specialist–given his long relationship with the Beaux Arts Trio for over fifty years–Pressler has enjoyed at various stages of his long career renown as a concert soloist and recitalist. Indeed, his most recent appearances at the California Menlo Festival complement this disc, particularly with that Festival’s issue on CD (Menlo 2009, 6) of the two Mendelssohn trios, just reviewed here.
The G Minor Piano Concerto with Swarowsky quickly and rather slickly establishes Pressler’s bravura credentials, although the Andante movement receives a swathed cello sound and tender applications of the Mendelssohn capacity for instrumental arioso and songs without words. The fleet and bombastic last movement resonates with pearly energy, Pressler’s staccato notes like bullets from a Gatling Gun. The moto perpetuo effects scurry across the pages of our minds with color and brio, the whole enterprise spirited, glittery, and eminently shallow emotionally.
Mendelssohn was only fifteen-years-old in 1824 when he composed the Piano Sextet in D Major as part of his composition studies with Carl Zelter. The presence of the doublebass aligns the collegial work with the instrumentation of the Schubert Trout Quintet. The ensemble with Pressler hustles through the first movement, the concertante violin part rendered sweetly by Daniel Guilet, David Soyer’s somber cello intoning burnished figures in the bass. The running scales in large periods create a liquid atmosphere of sound, the interior harmonies luxuriant in a style derived from Mozart and Hummel. The patina of the recording–culled from Parlophone as well as MGM–comes off somewhat muddy, but Pressler’s instrument sounds relatively crisp, the youthful exuberance of the piece intact. Tender mercies define the Adagio, the violas–William Schoen and Nathan Gordon–permitted to shine in sweet musings. Over a pulsing ostinato Pressler has a solo meditation of some length. The brief Minuetto moves with a silken grace, occasionally threatening to erupt into a full scherzo. Its counter theme is a dotted march that allows the pairs of strings to respond antiphonally. The swaggering Allegro vivace emerges a bravura but ephemeral polacca or national dance that thunders and rambles in good humor, the piano part quite sparkling in conversation with Guilet’s violin. The music divests its national character for a more brilliant filigree reminiscent of early Chopin and all of Hummel. The last pages, though, assume a new passion and drive that quite belie the streamlined and surface virtuosity of the prior music.
Mendelssohn composed his six “Christmas” children’s pieces in 1842, and the opening G Major certainly reminds one of Schumann’s Op. 15, especially “A Curious Story.” The E-flat plays as a soft nocturne, a sweet lullaby with a moving bass line. The Allegretto in G provides a bagatelle in staccato figures and a touch of doubled notes. The dreamy D Major Andante con moto resembles a gondolier’s song, a mode at which Mendelssohn excelled. An excursion into G Minor for the Allegro assai, with dramatic hints of sylvan secrets. We end in F, Vivace, an etude of some brittle energy carried off in sterling fashion by Pressler, despite some scratchy sound in my transfer.
The 1841 Variations serieuses remains Mendelssohn’s most profound keyboard piece, and even its opening theme bears the imprimatur of a religious chorale. The seventeen variants test every aspect of Pressler’s awesome arsenal, including the alternate use of legato, staccato, and sweeping chordal progressions. The inferences from Bach appear as natural extensions of Mendelssohn’s own virtuosity. When the score calls for “sempre staccato e leggier,” Pressler’s tonal palette proves ravishing, but so are his flamboyant runs and arched melodies over ostinato 16ths. The last two variations push the envelope of technique, the main theme returning over a pedal point, and Pressler carries the challenge off with a certitude and stylistic affinity that make the disc a keeper.
Mendelssohn’s Rondo (1828) asks for two approaches: the first, Andante in 4/4, wants Pressler to sing and indulge in romantic rhetoric of a high-flown arioso. The octave shift occurs fluently, and we are in the mist of a Presto in 6/8, scurrying in figures reminiscent of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The bold writing has Weber as a model, but Mendelssohn’s stunning magic is his own. Repeated bass notes and tremolandi suffuse the later pages, and the intensity culminates in boisterous fashion at the rousing coda, all deftly accomplished by Menahem Pressler in superb form.
–Gary Lemco
