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Robert & Clara Schumann: Piano Trios / Swiss Piano Trio
Audite Musikproduktion · Jan 2013SACD$21.99 -
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FARRENC: SYMPHONIES NOS. 1-3 OVERTURES 1 & 2
Robert & Clara Schumann: Piano Trios / Swiss Piano Trio
C. SCHUMANN Piano Trio in g, Op. 17. SCHUMANN Fantasiestücke, Op. 88. Piano Trio No. 3 in g, Op. 110 • Swiss Pn Tr • AUDITE 92549 (SACD: 77:42)
This is now the third occasion on which I’ve been privileged to review a new release by the outstanding Swiss Piano Trio. The ensemble’s Mendelssohn trios received an urgent recommendation from me in 34:6, and its account of Tchaikovsky’s Trio, if not quite as enthusiastically received by me in 36:3, still earned my nod of approval. Expectations for this Schumann disc thus ran high, and, I’m happy to report, they were not disappointed.
Clara Schumann (1819–1896) was a devoted wife, loving mother, accomplished pianist, and, no doubt, a composer of some talent. But I’ve always felt that her eminence in the latter capacity has been exaggerated both by virtue of her being spouse to one of the most famous of romantic composers and for being somewhat of that 19th-century novelty, a female composer. It has thus come about that when someone is asked to name three or four women composers, Clara Schumann invariably tops the list. Yet, if one 19th-century composer of the female gender deserves equal billing with her male counterparts, it’s not Clara Schumann or Fanny Mendelssohn; it’s Louise Farrenc (1804–1875), a composer who wrote symphonies and chamber works on a scale and of a quality comparable to many of her male contemporaries.
The Piano Trio in G Minor, dated 1846, is Clara’s only large-scale chamber work; in fact, it’s her only chamber work of any scale, period. Most of her catalog consists of songs and pieces for solo piano, though, as a teenager, and later, with the help of her husband to be, she did try her hand at a Piano Concerto. The trio was long held to be Clara’s crowning compositional achievement; some even credited it with being the inspiration for Robert’s first numbered Trio in D Minor, op. 63, written the following year. Thus, I was rather surprised to find fewer recordings of Clara’s opus listed than I would have expected; and of those currently in the catalog, more than one logically pairs it with Fanny Mendelssohn’s Trio in D Minor, written in the same year, 1846.
Whether pairing Clara’s trio with Robert’s third and final Trio in G Minor, composed in 1851, is a logical choice or not, I can’t say, although it seems to me that juxtaposing Robert’s D Minor, the one supposedly inspired by Clara’s effort, would have made more sense. However, in addition to Robert’s G-Minor Trio, Clara’s trio also shares the disc with Robert’s 1842 Fantasiestücke , which, though otherwise named, is his actual first work in the medium, though not designated or numbered as such. The present program therefore makes this new release unique, at least insofar as other current listings are concerned, although another recent disc, which also happens to be in SACD format, contains Clara’s trio and Robert’s G Minor-Trio, but not Robert’s Fantasiestücke . That recording by the Boulanger Trio on the Ars Produktion label was filled out with a work for piano trio by Wolfgang Rihm, and was favorably reviewed by Steven E. Ritter in 33:5
I’ve not heard the Boulanger disc, but the playing here by the Swiss Piano Trio leaves nothing to be desired. I doubt that Clara’s trio has ever received a more loving performance. The only word that describes the ensemble’s tone is voluptuous, and Audite’s perfectly positioned and balanced recording affords that ideal sweet-spot perspective. I do agree with Steven that Clara’s trio is not Robert’s. One has only to listen to the first few bars of Robert’s G-Minor Trio to recognize the difference between talent and genius. But I honestly have to say that I don’t think I’ve ever appreciated Robert’s trio as much as I have in this performance. The Swiss players seem to be absolutely swept away by the score, sweeping me away in turn. It doesn’t even feel like they’re performing the piece as much as they’re becoming one with it and living and breathing it.
This is definitely going on my provisional list of Want List candidates for 2013, and I most strongly urge you to acquire it. The Swiss Piano Trio, in my opinion, has rapidly risen to become one of the very top piano trio ensembles on today’s stage.
FANFARE: Jerry Dubins
Pejacevic: Symphony, Op. 41; Phantasie Concertante / Rasilainen, Banfield, Rheinland-pfalz State Philharmonic
PEJA?EVI? Symphony in f?. Phantasie Concertante for Piano and Orchestra • Ari Rasilainen, cond; Volker Banfield (pn); Rheinland-Pfalz St PO • CPO 777418 (62:42)
Cpo, a label noted for ferreting out obscure repertoire, has outdone itself this time by digging up not just another female composer—that alone wouldn’t be so rare—but a Croatian one to boot. Heretofore, I don’t think I could have named a single Croatian composer of any gender, but now I can. Short-lived Dora Peja?evi? (1885–1923) was actually born in Budapest, the daughter of a Croatian father and a Hungarian mother, the Countess Lilla Vay de Vaya, an accomplished pianist and Dora’s first teacher. On her father’s side, Dora was descended from a distinguished noble family in Slavonia, the eastern region of Croatia. In composition, she was largely self-taught, but she did receive some private instruction in Zagreb, Dresden, and Munich. She died at 38 following complications of childbirth.
During her short life, she produced 58 documented works. That number isn’t particularly noteworthy compared to other composers who died even younger and wrote much more, but what is worth mentioning is that like another female composer, the French Louise Farrenc (1804–75), Peja?evi? competed with the boys in the arena of large symphonic, concerted orchestral, and chamber works. In addition to the symphony and concert fantasy on this disc, known and/or published works include a piano concerto, sonatas for piano, violin, and cello, and a piano quintet. During her life, her music was not entirely unknown in the music capitals of Europe; it was heard in Vienna, Munich, Budapest, and Prague.
The works Peja?evi? left behind, to the extent they were acknowledged at all, must have seemed hopelessly outdated by a musical intelligentsia preoccupied with the latest compositional novelties. It’s not just that she embraced a musical vocabulary practically indistinguishable from any number of late 19th-century Romantic composers, but by the time she came to begin her F?-Minor Symphony in 1916, completing it a year later, the era of the big Romantic symphony was on life support, or at least on recuperative leave. Mahler had pretty much seen to that a decade earlier. Last-stand efforts by Rachmaninoff, Sibelius, Franz Schmidt, and a number of others didn’t change the fact that the symphony, as inherited from the 19th century, was about to take on new forms and modes of expression in the 20th.
Peja?evi?’s symphony, like Rachmaninoff’s Second, may have been written in the 20th century, but it belongs to the 19th. It’s your standard-issue four-movement effusively romantic affair—a rich tapestry spun from strands of long-breathed chromatically enhanced melody, luxuriant harmony, and opulent orchestration. It doesn’t seem to be much influenced by the Mahler-Zemlinsky-Schoenberg axis, though perhaps that shouldn’t be a surprise considering the very complex cultural cross-pollination of Croatia’s history by Hungarian, Italian, and even Russian influences. In fact, isolated passages throughout Peja?evi?’s symphony remind me a bit of Glazunov. But there are so many other crosscurrents going on in the score, not least of which is a passage at 7:54 in the first movement that sounds like it escaped from Dukas’s The Sorcerer’s Apprentice . But it quickly morphs into something that sounds like it was lifted from Strauss’s An Alpine Symphony.
If there’s any surprise at all in Peja?evi?’s piece it’s how upbeat and optimistic it sounds for a work ostensibly in a minor key. Her melodies have an almost Italianate character to them in their lithe and graceful manner, and if the title and notes didn’t identify the piece as being in minor, I’d bet the farm it was in major.
The piano Phantasie Concertante came two years after completion of the symphony. In a single movement lasting almost 15 minutes, the piece is a virtuoso vehicle that alternates between Gershwin-like bluesy harmonies and jazzy rhythms on the one hand and keyboard figuration right out of Rachmaninoff on the other. Just listen to the broad, lush melody beginning in the cellos at 6:12 and the florid passagework in the piano weaving around and entwining with it. It could have come from the first movement of Rachmaninoff’s Second Concerto. I hope someone from Hyperion is reading this, because Peja?evi?’s Phantasie and probably her piano concerto as well are ideal candidates for the next volume of the Romantic Piano Concerto series.
When you hear this piece you will wonder how Peja?evi? could have been forgotten. If the climax to the lengthy aforementioned passage doesn’t sweep you away, I can’t think of much else that will. The fact that Peja?evi? could develop, build, and sustain a musical paragraph of such length is evidence in itself that the woman could write circles around many of her peers, male or female.
Pianist Volker Banfield is stunning, as are conductor Ari Rasilainen and his Rheinland-Pfalz State Philharmonic forces. Cpo has done it again. I thought I’d already settled on my annual Want List selections, but this dark horse entry is just going to have to push another pick aside. Urgently recommended.
FANFARE: Jerry Dubins
Farrenc: Piano Works / Konstanze Eickhorst
Louise Farrenc, a fine early romantic-era composer, led a charmed life as a youngster. Born into a ‘high art’ family, she also had the advantage of coming into contact with dozens of other artistic families at the Sorbonne. With an impeccable cultural background and artistic bloodline, Farrenc was certainly in excellent position to learn piano and music composition. She also was trained by some of the most esteemed musical artists of the time: Antoine Reicha, Johann Hummel and Ignaz Moscheles.
Although Farrenc had to deal with restrictive views concerning acceptable female roles in life, she always considered herself first and foremost a composer of music. Her works were widely performed in Europe during her lifetime, but her current reputation is slim indeed. Her obscurity likely derives from two considerations. First, unlike Clara Schumann or Fanny Hensel, Farrenc was not aligned with a famous relative. Second, Farrenc’s music was of the Germanic tradition, and this style was not popular in 19th century France.
Of the best composers of Farrenc’s era, her music most reminds me of Beethoven’s with a dash of Chopin added into the mix. Her works display an expert sense of construction, ample variety of form and emotional content, and a fine penchant for attractive melodies. However, readers should not think that Farrenc possessed the musical inspiration of a Beethoven or Chopin. Farrenc’s musical magic is more in the range of Hummel and Reicha, which makes her music highly desirable as opposed to essential.
This is not CPO’s first Farrenc recording. The company has already issued a disc of Farrenc symphonies and another of her large-scale chamber works. Those recordings were well received, and I have no doubt that this new solo piano disc will also garner fine reviews. I should also relate that being a pianist, Farrenc’s early compositions consisted primarily of piano music, and that the works on the new disc are from her early career.
Konstanze Eickhorst has the honor of performing Farrenc’s piano music. Ms. Eickhorst is no stranger to Farrenc’s music, performing the piano parts of CPO’s previous chamber music disc mentioned above. Eickhorst currently enjoys a busy concert schedule that started with winning the Clara Haskil Competition in 1981 at the age of twenty. She has also won other piano competitions and performed with many of the most prestigious orchestras and conductors in Europe in addition to chamber music groups such as the Melos Quartet, Carmina Quartet, and the Linos Ensemble. Eickhorst has played a wide range of keyboard music from the Baroque period up to contemporary pieces. Her recordings include Bach’s Goldberg Variations for Bella Musica and Clara Schumann’s piano works on CPO.
Eickhorst programs three types of Farrenc’s piano music: works based on a basic theme with variations, character pieces and Études. Of the two variation works, the Air russe varié is the more contemplative and consists of a Preludio, Theme, eight short variations and a Finale. This expansive structure is expertly crafted by Farrenc and quite distinctive. The Preludio is a serious Moderato of a pleading and compelling nature that is followed by the basic theme that I must admit is rather simple in the manner of the Diabelli theme that Beethoven made into a marvel of variation technique. Although not at Beethoven’s exalted level, Farrenc gives us eight inventive variations. The Finale is rather special, having a first section of Bachian fugue proportion with overlapping voices and a second section of exuberance and triumph.
The other variation work, the Variations brillantes, takes its basic theme from the cavatina "Nel veder la tua costanza" from Gaetano Donizetti’s Opera "Anna Bolena". Although of equal length to the Air russe varié, there are only four variations, which does lead to greater thematic development. Further, the Variations brillantes is very much a work for public display with its virtuosic requirements and exhilarating nature.
The two character pieces on the disc, the Valse brillante and the Nocturne, were both published in the early 1860s but may well have been composed in the early years of Farrenc’s musical career. Neither piece displays the brilliant artistry of Chopin’s character pieces, but both are rewarding in their own right. The Valse brillante is true to its title and consists of a series of contrasting dance themes of a generally upbeat and vivacious nature. The Nocturne is in the style of Chopin’s works in this genre and is quite lovely and poignant.
I have left the best for last: Eickhorst’s selection of nine of the thirty Études of Opus 26. With this body of music, Farrenc shows her expertise in conveying a compendium of the piano techniques used during the first decades of the 19th Century, employing the extended ‘circle of fifths’ as her structural guide. Of course, we are not able to follow the architectural path when only given selections, but Farrenc often programmed just a few of her Opus 26 Études in piano recitals. Each of the pieces is in ABA form and ranges in length from under two minutes to over four minutes.
The Études Nos. 22 and 19 are so propulsive and concentrated that they take on a relentless quality that is compelling. No. 7 is a gorgeous and uplifting Andante, while No. 4 is thoroughly invigorating. Contemplation and melancholy pervade No. 10, and No. 11 has the relentless qualities mentioned for Nos. 22 and 19. My personal favorite is No. 12, another Bachian style fugue that clearly reveals Farrenc’s affinity for baroque form and counterpoint.
In summary, the new CPO disc of Farrenc solo piano music is a highly rewarding effort having both excellent music and performances. The recorded sound is fine, although a little thin compared to current standards of piano richness in recordings. This enjoyable disc represents great entertainment value and should appeal to piano enthusiasts and anyone wanting to travel the byways of the early romantic period.
-- Don Satz, MusicWeb International
