Mordecai Shehori: The Celebrated New York Concerts, Vol. 6 = Works of CZERNY, BRAHMS, DEBUSSY, RAVEL, HOROWITZ, BACH = Cembal d'amour

by | May 4, 2012 | Classical CD Reviews

Mordecai Shehori: The Celebrated New York Concerts, Vol. 6 = CZERNY: “La Ricordanza” Variations in E-flat Major, Op. 33;  MENDELSSOHN: 3 Songs Without Words: C Minor, Op. 38, No. 2; G Minor, Op. 53, No. 3; F-sharp Minor, Op. 67, No. 2; BRAHMS: Four Klavierstuecke, Op. 119; DEBUSSY: Valse Romantique in F Minor; HOROWITZ: Etude-Caprice “Les Vagues”; Waltz in F Minor; Dance Excentrique in C Major; RAVEL: La Valse; J.S. BACH: Sicilienne in G Minor (arr. Shehori); DAQUIN: Le Coucou; PROKOFIEV: Prelude in C Major, Op. 12, No. 7; CONFREY: “Humourlessness (After Dvorak) – Mordecai Shehori, piano – Cembal d’amour CD-166, 66:05 [Distr. by Qualiton] ****: 
Pianist Mordecai Shehori assembles a diverse collation from his New York recital venues Merkin Concert Hall, Weill Recital Hall, and Alice Tully Hall, recorded in concert 1983-2003. Rather compelling for admirers and collectors alike are the various pieces that pay homage, directly and indirectly, to Shehori’s mentor, Vladimir Horowitz. In a brief letter to me, Shehori traces something of the etiology of his own history with the offering on Band 10: Etude-Caprice “Les Vagues” by Horowitz himself:
Wanda [Horowitz] gave me the score in 1990, which is the only piece of music Horowitz actually put on paper, age 14. It was difficult to read because of the cheap Russian paper and ink which smeared areas, and the ink traveled to the other side of the pages, too. It made it difficult to read. I did crazy things [to reconstruct it]. I transferred it to 11 by 14 color paper, turning my bath into a dark room. Anyway. . .the works lead into each other. . .
Shehori opens (20 April 1983, Merkin Hall) with Carl Czerny’s 1822 La Ricordanza Variations, a Horowitz staple. It appears that Czerny chose the theme by French violinist Pierre Rode (1774-1830) after hearing the great soprano Angelica Catalani perform her own variations on the same theme. The title “La Ricordanza,” The Reminiscence, seems to indicate that Czerny composed this delightful set while reminiscing about that concert. Of the five variations, the next to last proves the most brilliant, and Shehori glides through it with grace and facility. The three Mendelssohn Songs Without Words (6 February 1993, Weill Hall) pose few emotional problems, although each presents a dark color in salon style.
The “lullabies of my pain,” as Brahms described his own 1893 late Klavierstuecke (14 June 2003, Alice Tully Hall), dramatically changes the tenor of Shehori’s recorded recital. The B Minor Intermezzo, looks forward to Schoenberg in its chains of falling thirds, bleakly illuminated, a kind of T.S. Eliot landscape. The E Minor Intermezzo, Andantino un poco agitato, projects a rainy-day syncopation, moving to the tenderly-indicated middle section, wistfully melancholy. The 6/8 Intermezzo in C Major long endued as a favorite of Backhaus and Rubinstein. Shehori gives it a detached staccato patina and bravura crescendo as it moves rather impulsively to a potent coda. Many of the Brahms rhapsodies he conceives in sonata form. This E-flat Rhapsody opens Allegro risoluto, and Shehori does not restrain the emotional resolve which manages to infiltrate the grazioso central section. A fine sense of transition marks this temperamental colossus of a rendition, moving to a gruff maerchen in Schumann style that soon powers its way to a bristling resolution in the tonic minor.
Debussy’s F Minor Valse Romantique (1890) derives from his studies at the Paris Conservatory. Gieseking used to champion its sectionalized lyricism, and Shehori (14 June 2003) certainly bestows a luxuriant gloss on  the dainty interplay of light and dark, glitter and exuberant arpeggiation of its sweeping figures. The Horowitz Etude-Caprice (6 February 1993, Weill Hall) seems derived from Debussy but also Faure, as it proceeds in toccata style in passing modal harmony. The Horowitz Waltz in F Minor (14 June 2003, Alice Tully Hall) bears a thick Russian melancholy, perhaps touched by Tchaikovsky cross-fertilized by Medtner. Horowitz himself made a recording of his own Danse Excentrique in C Major, with its homage to Stravinsky and Debussy, a Russian Golliwog’s Cakewalk. Shehori makes it pert and suave seductive, always athletic.
The last large piece is Ravel’s own solo-piano arrangement of his La Valse (20 April 1983, Merkin Concert Hall). Ravel composed the piece in 1919, and like his many dance-forms, this too explodes at the finish to indicate a farewell to a defunct sensibility. Shehori imbues as sensuous a wash upon the score as one might wish, quite as ravishing in my memory as that of my first encounter with the piano score under Leonard Pennario. Shehori seems quite conscious of its alternate ego, its Poeme choreographique persona, infusing the episodes with a decided dance character, balletic and rhetorical at once. Pearly play and a stunning layered tone pervade the performance, elevating the sonic effect to orchestral heights. As the last notes of the coda disappear, their sound is replaced by exuberant applause.
The arrangement of the Sicilienne from the Flute Sonata No. 2 by J.S. Bach used to provide Wilhelm Kempff the perfect encore. Here (14 June 2003) at Alice Tully Hall its delicate shades and singular melos enshrine Shehori with a signature that may serve him as the “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” served Myra Hess. Daquin’s fleet “Le Coucou” often identified Shura Cherkassky. Shehori renders a sweet toccata from its warbling in purring, dragonfly touches. The Prokofiev Prelude, which I first heard from Emil Gilels, mixes toccata and etude into a startling, lovely leggierissimo vehicle for Shehori’s especial piano tone. Finally, a bit of dry humor, all sorts of puns intended, as Confrey redistributes Dvorak’s Op. 101 Humoresque into stride and jazz figures by way of Joplin and Gershwin. A delighted audience chuckles as the Swannee River makes its way into Bohemia.
—Gary Lemco

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