SCHUBERT: Sonata No. 21 in B-flat Major, D. 960; 3 Klavierstuecke, D. 946 – Lars Vogt, piano – Avi-Music, 76:09 [Distrib. by Allegro] ****:
Recorded 2006-2007, these Schubert staples by Lars Vogt (b. 1970) pay particular attention to the composer’s intentions, and include Vogt’s taking the first movement repeat–with its infamous “trill of death” played sforzatissimo–and thus stretching the opening movement for a full twenty-two minutes’ struggle between forces of light and darkness, where the malevolent forces often predominate.. Vogt also plays the first version of Schubert’s E-flat Minor Klavierstuecke, with its two middle sections, another concession to the composer’s “heavenly length.” In every way, the atmosphere of tragic intimacy permeates this disc, a Schubertiad in the spirit of the composer’s only public concert in March 1828. That Vogt can sustain the tension in the first movement without incurring various melodic sags in the line testifies to a forceful, lyric gift and any number of degrees of dynamic nuance. From anxiety and fear of loss we proceed to the dirge-like Andante sostenuto, built as it is from a motif within the first movement’s tender lament. Vogt’s graduated harmonic progressions reflect a deconstructionist view of the harmonic rhythm, breaking Schubert’s small phrases into microcosms of gloom. Out of this cold night a sweet song does emerge, Orpheus still singing after the maenads have done their worst. But for beauty of sonority, listen to Vogt’s mellifluous tenor and soprano voices from his keyboard, always tempered by pregnant silences. The C-sharp Major ending seems a grudging bit of heaven after so many tears. Vogt plays the Allegro vivace Scherzo with that deliberate ‘with delicacy’ that eschews brilliant abandon and finds instead intimations of mortality, especially in the jabbing, isolated bass tones. The spirit of frenetic wandering saturates the final movement’s runs of 16th notes, occasionally bursting with agonized despair. The Apollinian elements of symmetry and grace have indeed become fearful. Vogt keeps a lithe, light hand on the proceedings – that lone chord often a sad, negative commentary on all our efforts to make sense of a tragic world.
Restless agitation opens the Three Piano Pieces, this in E-flat Minor. Vogt provides a muscular, aggressive bass line that soon moves chromatically to the first middle section; Schubert was clear in his intention that the second middle section not be published in his original score. Vogt includes the second interlude simply because he finds it beautiful, at the risk of making the piece quite long. That middle section, part laendler, part diaphanous, courtly dance, soon passes back into the throes of the dark, introductory material. The C Minor is Vogt’s personal favorite, a combination of tender melancholy and agitated, Romantic Agony. The last piece, in C Major, plays like a scherzo except that its ironies become savage, in the spirit of gallows humor. Vogt’s playing communicates poise and mechanical security in every bar, intelligently passionate.
–Gary Lemco
