Robert Casadesus = MOZART: Piano Concerto No. 23 in A Major, K. 488; BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-flat Major, Op. 73 “Emperor”; RAVEL: Piano Concerto in D for the Left Hand – Robert Casadesus, piano/Cologne Radio-Symphony Orchestra/Georg-Ludwig Jochum (Mozart)/Christoph con Dohananyi (Beethoven)/Hermann Scherchen (Ravel)
Medici Arts MM032-2, 78:16 [Distr. by Naxos] ****:
More treasures from the art of Robert Casadesus (1899-1972), who according to Toscanini, “was born to play Mozart.” From the archives of Cologne Radio, we have the familiar Concerto No. 23 in A (7 March 1956) played with fervent speed by Casadesus, but he still maintains that golden mean by which the clarity of long line suffers neither disruption nor ugly sound. Jochum’s cadences sail with breezy affection while Casadesus executes lightning runs and roulades that break off into the galant, measured ariosi that make this bravura showpiece a perennial delight. Warm clarinet playing accompanies Casadesus’ upward scales, his trills whirlwinds of seamless control. The cadenza glitter in stately heraldry, the trill leading to a suavely contoured coda whose woodwind and string parts chirp with easy, stylistic grace.
The F-sharp Minor siciliano showcases Casadesus’ parlando style, his steady left-hand pulsation, and his subtle rubato. The warbling woodwinds and piano create an outdoor moment of chamber music, to which the French horn and flute bring an added luster. When the bassoon and plucked strings enter the serene mix, we have been dining on Mozartean ambrosia, wherein the spirit of the composer’s Solemn Vespers is nigh. The Allegro assai runs like musical champagne, the piano and bassoon vying for buffa celebrity. The musical line virtually scampers, skips, and sings under Casadesus’ inspired, crystalline touches, the whole moving with disarmingly quick aplomb, as technically and stylistically perfect a performance of the A Major Concerto as one could wish. Rather than audition the Beethoven directly after the Mozart, I treated myself to the Ravel D Major Concerto (11 March 1957) under the always-searching direction of Hermann Scherchen. Scherchen has the opening bass fiddles sawing with ominous grace, and the woodwinds climb a snaky vine with the tympani and horns clamoring for space. When Casadesus enters, the spirit of improvisational jazz already sets forth, as well as the rolling effect of one hand pedaled to imitate two. These effects return with striking purity in the cadenza near the concerto’s apocalyptic conclusion. Like a musical rock, Casadesus establishes a basic pulse, providing his own “accompaniment” and then cascading into the horn, tympani, and snare fanfare that creates an eddy of sound. Casadesus’ meditative passages resound in a liquid pool of orchestral colors, the harmonic-rhythm increasing until that flagrant burst of energy that opens the Gallic equivalent of a sarcastic, Roman march and jazz-stride variations. The variants become jeweled and deftly decadent, the bassoon reminding us that Stravinsky is not far away. Harp and zithery strings lead to winds, snare, and percussive stretti, a jazz symphony with piano obbligato that threatens to lose control just as the falsetto voices and the piano’s D Major scales reassert themselves in a conciliatory sonata-cyclic form.
The Beethoven Emperor (29 January 1965) often elicited the mighty grandeur of which Casadesus was capable, beyond “mere” graciousness and speed, his most famous collaborations having been with Mitropoulos (for CBS) and Previtali. Dohanyi and Casadesus have opted for a long-lined Beethoven, straightforward and intelligently colored without excess of pedal or romantic expression. The balance between improvisatory runs and measured, colored arpeggios and trills proves ever compelling, the woodwinds infiltrating the spaces between the beats, along with the plucked strings. The evenness of pulse and tone pressure will warrant comparisons with that other, revered master of digital control, Michelangeli. The seamless quality of the musical periods can hardly be felt until we realize we are in the throes of the development section, horns and winds galloping or throbbing, accordingly. At the recapitulation, Dohnanyi leans heard into the cadence, and Casadesus mounts Parnassus with glistening scales. The non-legato playing against the woodwinds ad French horn rings with pellucid clarity, the repeated notes like chimes. The music-box touch of the cadenza passage before the French horn entry heralds a sudden surge to the coda, a plastic, infinitely sensuous rush of explosive improvisation, yet utterly contrived into the most graduated series of roulades at the heroic peroration.
Nothing sentimental about the Adagio un poco mosso, which again moves in amber, steady waves. The trills melt into a cosmic dew rife with consolation. The plastic harmonies proceed in untainted innocence until that half-tone descent by which the bassoon and horn alert us that the Rondo is imminent. Casadesus’ entries enjoy a slight, acerbic bite, and Dohnanyi answers with striking, slick attacks in the winds and tympani. A marcato approach in the keyboard part imposes a clarion articulation to the main theme, and the towering runs lead to the series of playful variants in timbre, rhythm, and ornament that make the movement an auditor’s cornucopia. The strings play with the tip of the bow to add to the wit, as well as to the girth, of improvisation. The last pages synthesize the lustrous and the boisterous in a mighty, frothy brew that bespeaks a veteran’s realization of a much-beloved masterpiece.
–Gary Lemco
