TCHAIKOVSKY: Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor, Op. 23; GRIEG: Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 16 – Nelson Freire, piano/Munich Philharmonic Orchestra/ Rudolf Kempe
HDTT HDCD170, 61:45 ***** [available as CD-R or 96K/24bit DVD-R [www.highdeftapetransfers.com]:
Recorded by CBS in May 1968 and remastered from commercial 4-track tape, this HDTT disc qualifies for Best of the Year status from the very first notes of the popular 1874 Tchaikovsky Concerto. Rarely has the sonic definition of the piano and orchestra maintained both lucid musculature and suave grace–perhaps in the Richter/Karajan DGG recording with the Vienna Symphony–while preserving the tonal accuracy and linear architecture of the whole. The same superlatives apply to the realization of the world’s most perfect keyboard concerto, Grieg’s 1870 Concerto in A Minor.
Nelson Freire (b. 1944) finds both the Tchaikovsky and the Grieg concertos sympathetic to his taste, which, when wedded to the orchestral nuances provided by the late Rudolf Kempe (1910-1976), results in some spectacular music-making, one of the more potent products of the Weiss digital process. After a sweeping introduction, Freire sets the lavish scale of the Tchaikovsky, with its idiosyncratic desire to repeat each phrase twice–a la Schumann– with steely finesse, the keyboard ablaze with etched, shapely articulation. The flute, oboe, and viola of the second movement attain as much intimacy as the first movement vibrates with ostentation. The wizardry of the last movement syncopations on a Ukrainian song become fiendishly glib, as Freire and Kempe cascade to the maestoso tutti with unbridled Russian fire.
The Grieg Concerto never ceases to retain its folkish freshness in the face of innumerable performances. If Freire has a model of execution here, it is likely Dinu Lipatti, the very instantiation of clean, brilliant filigree saturated with subtle poetry. Besides the silken fioritura in Freire’s rendition, there resides a palpable joie de vivre in the sheer plastic mechanics of rendering one melody after another in seamless progression. The Adagio projects an almost Oriental, spatial quality–the sense of form against a vacuum–that Japanese ink drawings possess, the diminuendos dissipating into nothingness. The last movement divides itself transparently between martial panache and earthy song, the last pages syncopated and playful and towering at once. Why deny yourself–hie thee to a copy!
— Gary Lemco
