MOSCHELES: Hommage Characteristique a la Mémoire de Madame Malibran de Bériot, en Forme de Fantaisie; MENDELSSOHN: Nine Songs (transcribed for piano by FRANZ LISZT, S. 547 and S. 548); Sonata in E Major, Op. 6; SCHUMANN: Variations on an Original Theme in E-Flat Major, WoO 24 – Todd Crow, piano – MSR Classics MS 1338 [Distr. by Albany], 65:30 ****1/2:
This CD is the result of a project that pianist Todd Crow undertook for the BBC. The program was recorded in studio, at the Concert Hall of the BBC Broadcasting House in London, for later broadcast on BBC Radio 3. Though a studio recording, the program was set down with minimal edits to capture some of the excitement and unpredictability of a live performance. To a large extent, it’s a concept that succeeds in execution. These are all vibrant, sometimes scintillating performances. And it seems that Crow was in very good form for the session. If there are any flubs or indeed edits, I don’t detect them, though in a typical studio setting Crow might have asked to retake some of the grueling runs and arpeggios that Liszt dishes up in the two song transcriptions S. 548 (“Wasserfahrt” and “Der Jäger Abschied”). They could be a tad more cleanly and clearly executed, but who’s complaining? This is exciting pianism.
Liszt’s contributions in these song transcriptions are of a varied nature; some of the songs emerge pretty close to the original (“Neue Liebe,” “Winterlied”); some, like the wild ride Liszt supplies for “The Hunter’s Farewell,” see him going his own way, with his usual pianistic daring-do. Still, Liszt respects Mendelssohn’s sturdy melodies: no missing the familiar tune from “Auf Flügeln des Gesanges” (“On Wings of Song”).
While the songs are the products of the fully mature Mendelssohn, the Sonata Op. 6 is the product of a Mendelssohn mature only in talent. It appeared in that wonder year of 1826—when the composer was all of seventeen—that saw also the Overture to a Midsummer Night’s Dream and the First String Quintet. As with Mendelssohn’s first two string quartets written around the same time, the Sonata pays tribute to late Beethoven, specifically Beethoven’s Sonatas Op. 101 and 110. As the always-informative Misha Donat says in his fine program notes, Mendelssohn’s gentle, quasi-fantastic opening movement imitates the first movement of Beethoven’s Op. 101, while Mendelssohn’s slow movement is a near-tragic quasi-recitative in the style of Beethoven’s Adagio from Op. 110. Still, this is Mendelssohn; the Tempo di Menuetto is a slowed-down version of one of Mendelssohn’s fairy-world scherzi, while the last movement is an ebullient perpetuum mobile, sounding like a Weber last movement filtered through Mendelssohn’s own brand of optimistic Romanticism.
The long-lived Ignaz Moscheles was a traveling virtuoso and teacher when Mendelssohn was still in short pants and outlived the later by more than twenty years. In fact, Moscheles gave piano lessons to the fifteen-year-old Mendelssohn and remarked then on his genius. They became friends, and Mendelssohn later returned the favor, inviting Moscheles to become professor of piano at the Leipzig Conservatory. Early Mendelssohn owes a debt to Moscheles as well. Some of the figurations in the last movement of Mendelssohn’s Sonata Op. 6 recall Moscheles as well as Weber.
Moscheles’ own Hommage Characteristique is, indeed, pretty characteristic of his particular style of early Romantic piano writing. It’s an homage to Maria Malibran, one of the greatest opera singers of her day and a friend of Moscheles, who collapsed and died while performing at the age of twenty-eight. True to its fantastic nature, the Hommage ranges from the quiet, singing opening to a fevered and lamenting middle section before the end brings calm and a vision of the afterlife. It makes for a good opening number in this feast of early Romantics.
Closing out the program, there is Schumann’s Geistervariationen (“Spirit Variations”), so called because Schumann, on the eve of his final mental breakdown, thought the melody had been brought to him in a dream by the spirits of Schubert and Mendelssohn. Actually, it bears a striking resemblance to the theme from the slow movement of Schumann’s Violin Concerto written two years earlier (1852). Schumann subjects the theme to very straightforward variations without any of the brilliance of his earlier pianistic style, but the Geistervariationen has a lovely tune and gentle melancholy that managed to deliver it from the near-oblivion it languished in until publication in 1939.
The radio program featuring these works was called “Song without Words.” As the title implies, these are mostly pieces where a singing line seems more important than formal rigor. Todd Crow makes them sing very convincingly. His playing is characterized by powerful technique, a colorful tonal palette, and a fine sense of phrasing. While most of these works are available elsewhere, Crow’s program seems an ideal way to hear them. Listening to Crow, I don’t pine for Murray Perahia’s excellent Mendelssohn disc on Sony, and that’s praise indeed, I think.
The BBC studio sound is very good, with a fine bloom and not a hint of studio boxiness—very truthful. In all, a disc with smart programming and admirable execution.
– Lee Passarella
