Rachmaninoff, Sergei.
Piano Concerto No. 4 in G-Minor, Op. 40;*
Variations on a Theme of Corelli, Op.
42;
Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-Flat Minor, Op. 36;
Prelude in C-Sharp Minor, Op.3, No. 2.
Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Pianist.
* - Cleveland Orchestra, Vladimir Ashkenazy,
Conductor.
Decca/London 458-930-2 (Digital Stereo)
Recorded at Henry Wood Hall, London, October
1997 & *Severance Hall, Cleveland, January 1996.
I have heard the future of Rachmaninoff pianists. His name is Jean-Yves Thibaudet. I've been aware of him being lauded as a great interpreter of Rachmaninoff, but have shied away from even listening to one of his recordings for a few years, because I feared the letdown would be too great, should he not live up to expectations (my breaking point came a couple of years ago, when I started hearing about this "wonderful new pianist, David Helfgott." I bought his CD of Rachmaninoff's Third and faster than you can say "Jackie Robinson," I was back in my car driving to Barnes & Noble to demand a refund of my money, or else I would sue the store for fraud - passing off an ineptly played garbling of notes as "Rachmaninoff." The stunned clerk, a master of public relations, quickly resolved the problem by issuing said refund. Anyways, a parenthetical scathing is all you read from my keyboard about Helfgott; He does to Rachmaninoff what Gus Van Sant did to Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho).
That spiel off my chest; now back to Thibaudet: His understanding
of Rachmaninoff is totally intuitive. It is like listening
to Barbirolli conduct Elgar, Robert Casadesus playing Ravel or Toscanini
conduct a Verdi opera. I rank him right up there with Rachmaninoff
and Horowitz themselves, I so admired his playing. On all the pieces,
what I heard primarily was a deep affinity and love for Rachmaninoff's
music coming through every note. However, as a pianist, he reminds
me more of Artur Rubinstein than any other pianist; his playing is
technically brilliant, yet he does not launch into the heavy incendiary
ordnance of Vladimir Horowitz. Rather, he caresses the ivories with
a poetic, melancholic, touch. Never do jumbled masses of sound emerge
from from his fingertips; in arpeggios and climbing chords, one can
hear each note played cleanly and distinctly. His melancholy is always
sad and poignant, but never submerging into bathos. In this sense,
he reminds me of Robert Casadesus playing Satie or Debussy. In his
later years, Vladimir Horowitz was called "The Last Romantic"; I
am hoping for music critics and writers to amend that thought - for the
time being, the young Jean-Yves Thibaudet can aptly carry that banner.
Thibaudet's performance of the Fourth Concerto exemplifies this
observation. A very difficult piece to perform properly, this is
the most satisfying recording I've heard of it, aside from the composer's
own. Although the Fourth is generally thought of as a "heavy"
concerto (especially as performed by Rachmaninoff and Ormandy), Thibaudet's
touch is the very essence of light. He does not play with as heavy
a hand as his accompanist, Vladimir Ashkenazy, did in his excellent 1984
recording with Bernard Haitink and the Concertgebouw Orchestra. Even
the chordal progressions towards the end of the first movement (Allegro
vivace) are dark, but not overbearing. What Ashkenazy does,
though, is provide a dark canvas of orchestral tonal shading, over which
Thibaudet spreads his melodic colours. Ashkenazy's conducting of
Rachmaninoff is very consistent with his Rachmaninoff symphonic cycle from
the 1980s (also with the Concertgebouw) -- crisp, precise and dramatically
tense. It is the counterpoint sections in which Thibaudet, Ashkenazy
and the Cleveland are most awe-inspiring.
The second movement (Largo) is played as a simple reverie by Thibaudet; it almost reminds me of Rachmaninoff's own Ampico piano-roll recording of Lilacs. It never seems to descend to the depths of depression the way Rachmaninoff's recording does, yet Ashkenazy wonderfully cues the horns in an ominous statement of a Dies Irae thematic variation. The bridge to the third movement (Allegro vivace) is played with understatement by Thibaudet and Ashkenazy, as Thibaudet launches into a very melodic and dexterous treatment of the movement's main subject. The middle section of the movement provides my only objection in Thibaudet's playing -- his fingers seem to linger on the keys a shade too much in the slow section. However, after repeated listenings, I have found myself growing accustomed to it; I find that I had grown so used to his feather-touch that any hint of heaviness seems incongruous. The build-up to the finale is suspenseful and spine-tingling; the violas, French horns and the 'cellos of the Cleveland Orchestra darkly offset Thibaudet's playing, the percussion providing a forceful and staccatoed parallel to Thibaudet's playing. I must hand it to Vladimir Ashkenazy: This is the best I've heard the Cleveland Orchestra play since the days of George Szell and Erich Leinsdorf.
The
finale itself is very triumphant; upon first hearing this recording,
it was the first time I recalled Rachmaninoff's Second Symphony
in relation to the Fourth Concerto. That is both Thibaudet's
and Ashkenazy's doing; emotionally and intellectually, you can tell
this performance is the progeny of two of Rachmaninoff's greatest living
devotees.
The solo works as played by Jean-Yves Thibaudet impart the same visceral, yet cerebral, understanding. Thibaudet's treatment of the Corelli Variations is played with the same quality he brings to the Fourth Concerto. The contrasts between variations are sharply delineated (especially from variations 5 through 7), all the while, Thibaudet is dramatically setting the tension up a notch with each successive variation up to the Intermezzo, even in the seemingly reflective ones such as Nos. 4 (Andante), and 8 (Adagio misterioso). My personal favourites are Nos. 13, Agitato and 19, Piu Mosso; Agitato, both of which Thibaudet executes with a manic, sharply focused, precision. The Corelli Variations, which are written in the same vein as Brahms' Variations on a Theme of Paganini, nonetheless build down, rather than up, to the movement's Coda, an understated Andante, which is Rachmaninoff's link to his next composition, his own Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. Thibaudet handles this last passage simply, eloquently, almost to the point of irresolution.
This disc's penultimate offering, the technically cumbersome Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-Flat Minor, Op. 36, is the first version by any pianist that can offer serious challenge to Vladimir Horowitz' recordings, yet it hardly recalls the Russian master's playing at all. Van Cliburn's recording is a serious disappointment, and Ruth Laredo's is to be admired for her technical accuracy, but is a bit on the sterile side, artistically. Inasmuch as what Thibaudet is trying to do is to reclaim this sonata artistically, is the degree to which he succeeds. I've heard this piece performed by a half-a-dozen pianists, but today there seems to be such an inordinate stress on the technical that the emotional and melodical get lost within the notes. After a blistering opening movement (Allegro agitato), Thibaudet treats the slow movement (Non allegro) with such honest simplicity, that the wistful emotions of quiet passion Rachmaninoff intended come through more so than in any other performance I've yet heard (including Horowitz). As blasphemous as it may sound, I prefer Thibaudet's second movement to any of the three I own by Horowitz. The Sonata's final movement, Allegro molto, is also imbued by Thibaudet with the same technical wizardry in the quick and heavy passages, in contrast to the slower, more reflective passages, which Thibaudet imparts gently and beautifully. This contrast is heard in the buildup to the finale, but unfortunately, tends to undermine the tension and release necessary in getting the listener "ready" for quicksilver fusillade of notes at the coda. If I were hearing this composition for the first time, I'd say that Thibaudet blew me away with the finale. But, alas, the Horowitz performances (especially the 1968 Columbia recording) define for me the true way to pull off the explosive fury required to bring this piece to its proper conclusion. However, in defense of Thibaudet, he comes far closer to the coda's ecstatic potential than Cliburn, Laredo or even Ashkenazy.
What better way to close such a wonderfully performed disc, full of lesser-heard Rachmaninoff compositions, than with the "over-played" Prelude in C-Sharp Minor, Op. 3, No. 2? (Rachmaninoff himself got so tired of being asked to perform the prelude as an encore, that he began loathingly referring to it as "that thing.") Thibaudet plays it at a languorous pace, coming in at five minutes exactly (Rachmaninoff recorded it at 3:36; again at 3:42). His treatment is quite heavy and somber, though never "interpretive." (For years, musicians and scholars have guessed at and imposed on a "program" for this piece, although Rachmaninoff himself always insisted that it was pure music, with no program intended).
This is the best new Rachmaninoff recording to be released in a long, long, time. Now I'm going to rush out and buy the two accompanying CDs, and - perhaps - change my mind.
