CHOPIN Piano Concerto No. 2: for piano and orchestra 1; for piano solo (arr. Chopin); for piano and str qnt (arr. Lively); for 2 pianos (arr. Chopin, Ekier, Kami?ski, and Fontana) • Cyprien Katsaris (pn); Edvard Tchivzhel, cond; Queensland SO; Heidelberg SO Qnt • PIANO 21 038 (2 CDs: 121:46) 1 Live: Brisbane 6/25/2010


Cyprien Katsaris is an eminent Chopin interpreter. I have enjoyed his recordings of the waltzes, ballades, and scherzos for Teldec, and his collaboration with Ofra Harnoy in the Cello Sonata on RCA. Now he gives us something truly special, the Second Concerto in four different interpretations. He bases the album on the premise that, in Chopin’s time, piano concertos were presented in four different versions: the original for piano and orchestra, one for solo piano, an arrangement for piano and string quartet or quintet, and finally a two-piano version with the orchestral part transcribed for the second piano. To render his endeavor even more interesting, Katsaris has recorded each version on a different make of piano. The subtle differences between each piano and each arrangement lend themselves to interpretations that are individual in every case. If the thought of hearing the same pianist play the Second Concerto four separate ways seems rather daunting to you, as it was to me at first, let me assure you that Katsaris has a mercurial enough musical soul to retain your interest throughout the album.


The set opens with the original concerto in a live performance featuring the distinguished Queensland orchestra, which can be heard on some fine Naxos CDs. Katsaris draws a sparkling sound in the first movement from his Hamburg Steinway. Tempos are brisk; Katsaris doesn’t dawdle over the melodies. The overall feeling in this movement is youthful, both in its energy and its passions. Perhaps it is not coincidental that Katsaris recorded a fine version of Schumann’s Scenes from Childhood for Teldec. The second movement offers beautiful bel canto, vocally inspired phrasing from the soloist. The runs embellishing the main theme are delivered elegantly. The orchestra appropriately here plays gently, with a lovely duet for piano and bassoon. Katsaris paces the final movement somewhat deliberately, offering a mixture of virtuosity and pensiveness—even subtle agitation. The principal clarinet and bassoon are a treat. Katsaris delivers a sense of ecstatic brilliance in the coda. In sum, this is a highly worthy version of the original concerto.


For Chopin’s own arrangement of the concerto for solo piano, Katsaris has chosen a Bösendorfer Imperial piano. It features an unusually wide dynamic range and great tonal resources. It has been captured in gorgeous sound by the engineers, one of whom is Günter Appenheimer, who produced so many fine recordings for Naxos in Bratislava around 1990. Katsaris has a penchant for solo piano versions of orchestral music; he was the first pianist to record all of Liszt’s transcriptions of Beethoven’s symphonies. Hearing Chopin’s orchestral tuttis on solo piano, one is struck by how much more flexible and expressive they can sound this way. This is especially true of the second subject in the opening tutti. Freed of the necessity to keep in touch with a conductor, Katsaris finds extra possibilities in phrasing. The first movement in particular becomes more dashing than with orchestra. Their absence also makes the pedaling sound clearer in the second movement. Chopin’s realization of the string tremolo passage there feels like a nocturne for solo piano. In the finale, the Bösendorfer’s tonal lushness creates a subtext of longing, that essential romantic emotion. The coda, however, does not sound quite as brilliant as it does on the Steinway.


Katsaris next presents a transcription of the concerto for solo piano and string quintet. This is a world premiere recording of the arrangement by the fine pianist David Lively, whose Brahms recital on Discover International I would recommend. Here, the accompaniment sounds more transparent than in the original. The fine string players are drawn from Thomas Fey’s excellent Heidelberg Symphony. The bite of the double bass has a particularly novel effect. For this performance, Katsaris has selected a Yamaha piano with a notably chocolaty tone. The second movement opens with a halo of string sound that leads to a luminous accompaniment. The piano’s tone here is appropriately warm. The tremolo passage from this movement sounds effectively gritty on five strings. The duet with piano where the cellist, Pirkko Langer, substitutes for bassoon is especially lovely. In the finale, the plummy bass of the Yamaha blends elegantly with the strings, particularly given the changes to the original’s bright trumpet parts. The cellist plays the horn call announcing the coda with relish. Katsaris’s interpretation of this movement retains all its brilliance.


Katsaris writes in his program note that Chopin enjoyed playing a second piano to accompany his students, not only in his own works but also in those of Hummel and Beethoven. To cobble together a two-piano version of the Second Concerto, Katsaris has drawn on three sources for the second piano part: Chopin’s piano solo version for the tuttis, the first movement accompaniment by the editors of the National Edition of Chopin’s works, and the accompaniment to the second and third movements by Chopin’s friend, the pianist and composer Jules Fontana. In this performance, Katsaris uses a piano new to me, that of Steingraeber & Söhne of Bayreuth. It has an unusually tart sound, which helps clarify hearing two pianos together. Employing technical wizardry, Katsaris has recorded both piano parts, which the engineers stitched together. The orchestral part is heard on the left-hand piano, the solo part on the right. The mass of these pianos’ sounds heard together is truly thrilling, given Katsaris’s virtuosity. Not just a technical stunt, he has conceived a rendition that blends the two pianos superbly. Given the Steingraeber’s tart tone, the slow movement here doesn’t sound quite so bel canto anymore—having more tension—but the orchestral part in the outer movements at times is thrillingly aggressive. The exchanges between the two pianos in the finale are exciting, and when they blend together at rapid tempos, Katsaris’s dexterity is a wonder to behold.


One must congratulate Katsaris for bringing out this project on his own CD label. I can think of very few record companies that would have been interested in it. The sound engineering in the string quintet and two piano versions is full and well balanced, while the live recording with orchestra, though clear, is a tad dry and up close. For the original concerto, I prefer the albums by Vladimir Ashkenazy with David Zinman and Witold Malcuzynski with Walter Susskind. Nevertheless, Katsaris has produced a unique collection that I would encourage every Chopin lover and piano aficionado to hear. I truly know nothing else like it.


FANFARE: Dave Saemann

This DVD of the recital that Cyprien Katsaris gave at the International Piano Festival of Shanghai Conservatory of Music features the first video recordings of three transcriptions: Katsaris’ own version of Bach’s Toccata and Fugue for Organ, BWV 565; Schubert’s ballet music Rosamunde, Princess of Cyprus by Ernst Pauer; and the Overture The Queen of Cyprus by Jacques-François Fromental Halévy, by Richard Wagner (!), who was an admirer of Halévy. In addition to a number of lesser-known works of Liszt, there is also a Chinese piece that Katsaris learned at the very last moment, an hour before the concert started, especially for the Shanghai audience.

Track Listing
LISZT: Funeral Prelude & March • Nuages gris • Hungarian Rhapsody No. 5 • Csardas obstinée • Bénédiction de Dieu dans la solitude • Am Grabe Richard Wagners • WAGNER (tr. Liszt): Isoldes Liebestod • GUANG: Silver clouds chasing the moon • HALÉVY (tr. Wagner): Overture to La Reine de Chypre • SCHUBERT: Rosamunde Fürtin von Cypern, D797 • Second Ballet Music No 9 (tr. Pauer) • 3 Lieder (tr. Liszt) • J.S. BACH (tr. Katsaris): Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565 • Prelude from The Little Clavier Book for Wilhelm Friedemann Bach (tr. Ziloti) • CHOPIN: Nocturne in E-flat, Op. 9, No. 2 • GOTTSCHALK: The Banjo • CARRASCO: Adiós

KATSARIS LIVE IN MOSCOW: THE INTERNATIONAL TCHAIKOVSKY COMPETITION, 1970 • Cyprien Katsaris (pn) • PIANO 21 029-A (55:17) Live: Moscow 6/3/1970; 1 6/12/1970 2


CHOPIN Etude in b, op. 25/10. 1 LISZT Etudes d’exécution transcendante: Feux follets. 1 RACHMANINOFF Etude-tableau, op. 39/1. 1 TCHAIKOVSKY The Seasons: October. 1 Dumka. 2 BACH Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I: Prelude and Fugue in c?. 1 HAYDN Sonata No. 48 in C. 1 SHOSTAKOVICH Preludes and Fugues: No. 24 in d. 2 RÄÄTS Toccata 2


MOZART Concerto for 2 Pianos in E?. 1 Concerto in F K 242 for 3 Pianos. 1,2 Concerto in F K 242 for 2 Pianos 2 • Cyprien Katsaris (pn); Eueng-Gu Kim (pn); 1 Mari Ota (pn); 3 Yoon Kuk Lee, cond; Salzburg CP • PIANO 21 031-N (72:54) Live: Salzburg 6/4/1999


First prize in the 1970 Tchaikovsky competition was shared by Vladimir Krainev and John Lill. Further down on the list (in fact, eliminated before the final round) was 19-year-old Cyprien Katsaris. Forty years after the fact, it’s easy to second-guess the judges. After all, despite Lill’s distinguished discography, Katsaris has developed into a more wide-ranging and more interpretively interesting pianist; and despite the fierce concentration of his best work, Krainev’s career has not matched his promise. Still, even Katsaris (who befriended Lill during the competition and who considers Lill’s victory “amply deserved”) was “not satisfied” with his own performances; and listening to this CD (which includes everything he played except the third movement of Boulez’s Second Sonata, which somehow never made it on to the original Soviet tape), it’s easy to see why. The virtuoso elements are sometimes pushed to the limit (or even beyond the limit), while the nod to Bach (required by the competition) is dutiful and dull.


Yet whatever the weaknesses, this is agile and often thrilling playing that—the Bach aside—should keep a strong grip on your attention. The furious, highly accented outer sections of the Chopin, the keen edge of the Liszt (played at a furious pace), the heart-on-the-sleeve “October”: the playing may be slightly unseasoned, but the enthusiasm is contagious, as is the technical facility. Even when Katsaris’s exuberance courts incoherence (as in his aggressive charge through the Rachmaninoff), he carries you along through sheer conviction.


In sum, it’s impossible not to regret that Katsaris didn’t get to the final round, where he would have played the Tchaikovsky First and the Rachmaninoff Third: the Moscow disc suggests that he would have seared the ears of his listeners. (You can hear slightly later performances of those concertos—the Tchaikovsky from 1973, the Rachmaninoff from 1978—on his Russian album, P21 020-A, reviewed in 31:5. They more than fulfill the expectations raised by the competition performances.) But even given his chipper reading of the Haydn—popular with beginning pianists, but hardly one of his more challenging works—this is not a pianist you’d want to hear in Mozart.


Then again, he’s not the pianist we hear in the 1999 Mozart performances, at least not in anything but the most literal sense. The Katsaris of 29 years later is a far richer musician, one who hasn’t lost his youthful delight in music-making, but who sees a lot more variety in the music before him, and who shades his playing accordingly. Writing about earlier installments in this complete run of the Mozart concertos (this is Volume 6), I called it “slightly old-fashioned Mozart that takes advantage of the modern piano’s range of color and articulation” (31:5)—and the same basic approach is heard here. But, as on the earlier releases, the interpretations steer a canny route between preciousness and romanticization: they’re elegant, tactful, and consistently less acidic than many period-instrument accounts, but they never condescend to the music. What’s most striking here—even more than on the solo concertos—is the conversational interplay: I don’t know how this sounded in the hall, but on these sharply focused CDs, the spiffy back and forth among the artists provides consistent pleasure.


Indeed, until now I’ve always found K 242 a dull affair, even in the hands of such experts as the Fleischers (I’ve not heard the recording praised by Mortimer Frank in 33:1, but I found it hard to stay awake when I heard them perform it live in Syracuse). Indeed, many first-rank pianists—for instance, the youthful all-star team of Kocsis, Ranki, and Schiff (see 29:4)—seem utterly bored when they take it on. But the exchanges in these recordings of K 242 by Katsaris and friends are so vital and alert that the music sounds considerably better that it actually is.


Note the plural in recording s . A few issues back (30:5), Jerry Dubins got his knickers in a twist over a recording of the two-piano version of the three-piano concerto, insisting that he “was not aware that [Mozart] had written more than one concerto for two keyboards,” and berating the record company for not clarifying who had made the arrangement. In fact, Jerry was just being ornery, since as he admitted, the program notes did offer clarification. To set the matter straight: Mozart himself both made and performed the two-piano compression of the three-piano K 242. The two-piano version has been played and recorded numerous times by, among others, Badura-Skoda and Gianoli, Perahia and Lupu, and the Fleischers. What’s unusual here is that Katsaris gives us both redactions—the first time, in my experience, that they’ve shared a single disc. In lesser hands, this would be too much of a not-very-good thing, especially since the arrangement is not especially adventurous (the original third-piano part was fairly rudimentary). But I doubt anyone listening will regret the repetition. The orchestral playing is tight and committed, and as I’ve said, the sound is exceptional. An unalloyed delight.


FANFARE: Peter J. Rabinowitz

"The DVD features an almost all-Latin American composer-based program performed in Shanghai, China. The front cover reads, “Music knows no frontiers.” Surely this is a marketing gimmick, and perhaps if the soloist were a less compelling guide, one that would work far less well than it does here. Throughout the recital, Katsaris plays music of contrasting textures and colors, from Nazareth’s rhythmic and sparkling Apanhei-te, Cavaquinho! to Villa-Lobos’s jazzy Coral to Campos’s more sentimental setting of the popular song La Paloma. The program has a wonderful sense of flow because of all of the different styles, textures, harmonic patterns, and characters that this music offers. Unfortunately, this recital also has its weaknesses. Before the introduction of each new composer, the pianist talks for what sometimes seems an eternity. Katsaris speaks first in English, then French, finally giving way to a translator (or two) to reinterpret the information. Though some of the information that he gives is fascinating in its own right, there is a time and a place for everything; a detailed program booklet or a commentary section at the end of the DVD would have done very nicely. Interestingly, and perhaps questionably, the pianist ends his recital with two encores: the Schumann Arabeske and the Chopin C?-Minor Waltz. As the recital is built completely on Latin-American music, the choices seem odd, though both pieces are well played. The Chopin, in particular, is interesting in terms of voicings: if one enjoys the type of interest in the inner parts which Godowsky, Cherkassky, Horowitz, or Gould often highlighted in their playing, then this interpretation will surely satisfy.

The DVD is highly enjoyable to watch, as long as one keeps the fast-forward button on the remote control under one’s fingers. The music is so engaging, though, that even with all the commentary, there is so much good music that one might never get the chance to hear, in performances that will in some cases knock your socks off, that this little quibble shouldn’t stop you from going out and grabbing this DVD. You won’t be disappointed!"

FANFARE: Scott Noriega

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Cyprien Katsaris has the looks of Dan Leno and the ingratiating charm of a boulevardier. He also possesses digital brilliance, and demonstrates the fact in this Latin-American programme filmed in recital at Shanghai Conservatory of Music on 2 October 2007.
 
What panache, what bravura! Certainly, an entire programme of pieces by Pablo Chávez Aguilar, Augustín Barrios Mangore, Ernesto Nazareth, Ignacio Cervantes and the like — and the like also takes in Ernesto Elorduy and Rubén Campos and others — may not appeal to sober sides who want their regulation three sonatas and high-minded encores. Katsaris can do that, too, but not here. Here the accent is on the positive, on the intriguing, and the exotically spiced. The recital was structured around various Latin American countries, from Peru, to Paraguay, then onto Brazil, Cuba, Argentina, Uruguay, and finally Mexico.
 
Each set of pieces is prefaced by a talk to audience from the pianist, microphone in hand, in English and then his native French. A voiceover sometimes aids things for the viewer, and sometimes hinders. A translator, dressed in crimson, translates his introductions into Chinese. Sometimes they confer about matters linguistic and hammer out an appropriate phrase. The opening speech is long, around seven minutes, so you may be tempted to fast forward to the music. You’d thereby lose the intimacy and charm of those distillation introductions that do tell one quite a bit about the music and the pianist’s thoughts on it.
 
The recital was divided into two parts. In the first there was, amongst much else by these composers, Aguilar’s fascinating Preludios Incaicos, replete with dazzling quasi-chinoiserie, Villa-Lobos’ stirring Coral (beautifully played) and Nazareth’s Odeon dispatched with true virtuosity but also a whimsical enjoyment of its charm. Highlights of the second part include Ginastera’s haunting, and hauntingly played, Danza Argentina No.2 and the tristesse purveyed by Piazzolla’s Chiquilin de Bachin. Katsaris also supplies his own free translation of Gerardo Matos Rodriguez’s La Cumparsita, a virtuosic piece of drama. He is so taken by Ponce’s lovely Intermezzo, or so taken by something someone in the audience says, that Katsaris briefly banters with them. He has a populist touch and the repertoire encourages emotional repartee like this. Stay to the end, where you’ll find José Antonio Gomez’s Variaciones sobre el Tema del Jarabe Mexicano distilled and driven onward in a blur of pianistic brilliance.
 
He plays two encores, remarkably European: Schumann’s Arabeske and Chopin’s Waltz in C sharp minor.
 
This recital combines drama, virtuosity, poetry and a highly personalised sense of barnstorming. Some may well consider the repertoire rather ‘samey’ but I find sufficient contrast. I also find the playing spectacular, and often breathtaking. The only demerit concerns the picture quality, and lighting, which is not that well defined, and being rather grainy, lacks clarity.
 
If you look, and listen, beyond that, though, there is a dazzler of a recital here.
 
-- Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International

Tracklist:
AGUILAR: 4 Preludios Incaicos • BARRIOS: Chôro de Saudade • VILLA-LOBOS: Coral • Aria • Alma Brasileira • NAZARETH: Odeon • Turbilhâo de Beijos • Nove de Julho • Apanhei-te, Cavaquinho! • CERVANTES: Soledad • Adiós a Cuba • GINASTERA: Danza Argentina No. 2 • PIAZZOLLA: La Misma Pena • Milonga en Ay Menor • Guardia Nueva • Chiquilin de Bachin • Milonga del Ángel • MATOS: La Cumparsita • ELORDUY: Tropicales • FLACCHEBBA: Danza Criolla • PONCE: Intermezzo • CAMPOS: 6 Popular Airs • Cancion Mexicana • El Aguanieve • La Paloma • Cielito Lindo • Son Michoacano

TRIBUTE TO CYPRUS

CYPRIEN KATSARIS LIVE

Robert Schumann has always played a special part in the life of Cyprien Katsaris. The enormous sincerity radiating from his work moves Cyprien profoundly and explains the affinity he feels for Schumann. The passion that attends Cyprien’s approach to the scores created by this great romantic at the tender age of 10 is clearly apparent in the recordings of this CD, taken at various concerts: Papillons (Butterflies) and Blumenstück (Floral piece) at Paris 2 University, Pantheon-Assas (1977), Kinderszenen (Scenes from childhood) in Tokyo (1989), Fantasy in Tallinn (1998) and Arabeske in the Clara Wieck Auditorium in Heidelberg (2003).

A tireless seeker of unfairly neglected works, Katsaris here offers an original programme on disc. This brings together for the first time five of the most beautiful concertos of the Bach family: Johann Sebastian, the famous father, and his sons: Wilhelm Friedemann, Johann Christian, Johann Christoph Friedrich and Carl Philipp Emanuel. Cyprien is here accompanied by the Echternach Festival Chamber Orchestra under the baton of the Korean conductor Yoon K. Lee. The pianist’s personal, disciplined approach carries the hallmark of a meticulous, inquisitive musical interpreter whose familiarity with this repertoire renders any philological squabbling irrelevant. He allows his inspiration free rein in these works, whence emerges their entire evolution, from Johann Sebastian’s rigorous polyphony to Wilhelm Friedemann’s pre-romantic development to Carl Philipp Emanuel’s robust theatricality.

PIANO 21’s first CD offers a unique opportunity to hear the first-ever recording of Beethoven’s ballet The Creatures of Prometheus, as arranged for the piano by the composer. This version, published by Beethoven before the orchestral score, was bizarrely ignored by pianists for some two hundred years... Cyprien Katsaris lays hold of the piece in a performance that brings out its climatic versatility, deploying a whole panoply of nuance, tone and sonority. The CD also features the only piano arrangement Beethoven ever made of one of his own symphonies: the first forty-six bars of the Seventh Symphony.

ELECTIVE AFFINITIES

LISZT Hungarian Rhapsodies: Nos. 2, 3, 5, 7. Elegies: Nos. 1, 2. Liebestraum No. 3. Klavierstücke: Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Trauervorspiel und Trauermarsch. Unstern! Nuages gris. La Lugubre gondola Nos. 1, 2. R.W.—Venezia. Am Grabe Richard Wagners. Piano Sonata in b. Piano Concerto No. 2 1 • Cyprien Katsaris (pn); 1 Arild Remmereit (cond); 1 Deutches SO Berlin • PIANO 21 014-N (2 CDs: 137:51)


SCHUBERT Klavierstücke, D 946: Nos. 1, 2. Ländler, D 366: Nos. 1 (2 versions); 2–5, 10, 13. Ländler, D 790: Nos. 3, 4, 7, 8, 11. Deutsche Tänze, D 420: Nos. 1, 3, 4. Piano Sonata in B?, D 960. SCHUBERT-LISZT Ständchen. Der Müller und der Bach. Ave Maria & • Cyprien Katsaris (pn) • PIANO 21 P21 042A (2 CDs: 103:27) Live: 7/3/93


& KATSARIS Improvisation on Themes of Tchaikovsky and Wagner. BACH Concerto in d, BWV 974: Adagio


“When I heard that recording, I was afraid to play the piece again—I will not play it again”: That’s how the mature Cyprien Katsaris, in an interview with me last year, described his reaction on rehearing this scorching live performance of the Liszt Sonata, taped when he was a youngster of 22 (see Fanfare 34:5). At the time, I wondered just how hyperbolic he was being. Now that I’ve had a chance to hear the performance—which concludes his two-CD Liszt sampler—I can easily understand why he feels that way. Granted, by the stopwatch (always unreliable, but especially so in a long work with dozens of tempo changes), this 29-minute reading is fairly centrist in overall timing. But it certainly doesn’t feel centrist. Rather, the overall effect is vertiginous—passages of almost terrifying impetus made even more ferocious by the extremity with which Katsaris plays many of the slower passages (try, for instance, the way he puts on the brakes as he approaches his arrival at measure 532, or the way he stretches the fermata before the Grandioso theme at measure 600). Yet for all the brinksmanship, for all the improvisatory bravura, there’s never a sense of approximation. Katsaris’s somewhat dry tone keeps the textures clear and his unerring control of articulation and accent keeps them active, with the result that the music consistently sounds both detailed and eventful. And in part because he has such a good sense of the music’s emotional architecture (including a sure understanding of the dramatic purpose of the recitatives), the music has a consistent sense of direction. This reading may not have the intellectual acuity of Steven Hough’s or the volcanic integrity of Ernst Levy’s or the depth of Richter’s many recordings. But for sheer adrenaline, the young Katsaris is a match for Simon Barere, and for sheer imagination, he’s got him beat.


The performance is doubly effective because it comes at the end of a recital that generally offers a rather different vision of both Liszt and Katsaris. Granted, once past the deceptively pensive opening, the high-speed performance of the Second Concerto is similarly searing—especially in the brilliant cascades in the final pages. Here, too, Katsaris ups the emotional ante with his careful articulation, which gives an unusually detailed profile to the musical gestures. And here too he manages to heighten things further with his extreme contrast (try the luxury of the Allegro moderato ). Granted, too, no one is likely to accuse him of underplaying the second Hungarian Rhapsody. But most of the rest of the performances—as befits the repertoire—are notable less for their razzle-dazzle than for their acute understanding of Liszt’s subtler rhetoric.


Thus, it’s not simply that Katsaris captures (even heightens) the strangeness of the radical late scores. More than that, the recording stands out because he manages to do so without turning the music abstract or damping its remaining romantic tendencies. Thus, he fully conveys the obsessive qualities of La Lugubre Gondola I —but he does so without losing the music’s sense of motion. Similarly, there’s no attempt to normalize La Lugubre Gondola II —but there’s no loss of the passionate desperation at its core. Listen to the marvelous tonal effects (including the artful pedaling) in Am Grabe or to the tremendous control of dynamics in the opening pages of the Trauervorspiel or to the disorienting contradictions of the Second Elegy (gloriously passionate, utterly bereft): Rarely has so strong a case been made for the emotional (as opposed to the experimental) qualities of these scores.


One caveat: As Patrick Rucker rightly pointed out in his knowledgeable review in Fanfare 35:4 (less enthusiastic than mine), this is not a collection for textual purists. The most startling deviation from the written score comes at the end of Trauervorspiel und Trauermarsch . Not only does Katsaris add a sonic halo to Liszt’s stark original, but he also throws in a striking effect: Just as the final sustained wash of sound seems to be dying away, it suddenly builds a crescendo. Can a piano really crescendo on a sustained sound? It certainly sounds as if there has been some electronic intervention, but in a series of e-mails Katsaris told me that it was a purely acoustical phenomenon created by the pedals. In any case, while it’s not quite what Liszt wrote, it does (at least to my ears) fit the mood of the music.


The sound varies according to the sources, but it’s generally good, and the studio performances—all of which are new—are a lot better than that. In the Second Concerto, the orchestra provides unusually rich and colorful support.


Schubert demands a rather different approach—and on this recital from 1993, he gets it. These are, on the whole, brightly illuminated performances, dryish in tone and often impulsive (although never rushed) in tempo. Thus, while the sonata is surely one of Schubert’s grander creations, there’s none of Horowitz’s intensity; indeed, Katsaris nearly whispers the third movement, and he offers a generally sunlit account of the finale. Yet for all the clarity, there’s no lack of melodic beauty (listen to the flexible melodic curls of the second of the Klavierstücke ), of timbral sensitivity ( Ständchen is exquisite), or (especially in his collection of Ländler and dances) of succulence and wit. Katsaris’s own fantasy on themes by Tchaikovsky (mainly Swan Lake ) and Wagner ( Tannhäuser , although Lohengrin might have been more fitting) is a delightful first encore—but the eloquent reading of the Bach, with its utter purity and peace, brings the recital to an even higher plane. Not quite as ear-catching as the Liszt recital, perhaps, but well worth owning even so.


FANFARE: Peter J. Rabinowitz

RUSSIAN PIANO MUSIC 4 HANDS

IF POETRY WERE SUNG TO ME?

CONCERTO NO. 5 ?EMPEROR?

ALBUM D’UN VOYAGEUR: VOLUME 1: EUROPE • Cyprien Katsaris (pn) • PIANO-21 032 (75:50)


LISZT Allegro Pastorale. R. STRAUSS An einsamer Quelle. J. STRAUSS JR-SCHÜTT An der schönen blauen Donau. BRAHMS Hungarian Dance No. 1. KATSARIS Free Improvisation on the Brahms Hungarian Dance No. 1. DVO?ÁK-KATSARIS Slavonic Dance, op. 72/2. HARRIS Piosenka o mojej Warszawi. PETYREK Zu Pressburg an der Donau. ELLER Andantino; Alla Ballata; Kodumaine Viis. SIBELIUS-KATSARIS Finlandia. HANNIKAINEN Suomalainen Kehtosävel; Debussyn Varjokuva. LEIFS Rímnadanslög No. 4. LATOUR Variations on Rule Britannia. RÖNTGEN Bergerette: Les Grandes Douleurs. ALBÉNIZ-GODOWSKY Tango. JAËLL Caprice brilliant on La Traviata. TRADITIONAL Kalamatianos. ECONOMOU Song of Freedom


VIENNESE CONNECTIONS • Cyprien Katsaris (pn) • PIANO-21 033 (2 CDs: 153:32)


BEETHOVEN Piano Sonata No. 8 in c, op. 13, “Pathétique”; 6 Ecossaisen, WoO 83; Ecossaise, WoO 86; 6 Kontretänze, WoO 14; Variations on a Waltz of Diabelli , op. 120/1, 13, 20 & 22. BEETHOVEN-LISZT Symphony No. 7: Allegretto. HÜTTENBRENNER Funeral Tribute to Beethoven in Chords; Erlkönig Walzer; 6 Variations, op. 2; Funeral Tribute to Schubert; Variation on a Waltz of Diabelli. SCHUBERT Variations on a Theme of Hüttenbrenner, D 576; 16 Ländler and 2 Ecossasien, D 734; Variation on a Waltz of Diabelli. LISZT Soirées de Vienne No. 2, S 427; Walzer, S 208a; Valse, S 210b; Ländler, S 211; Variation on a Waltz of Diabelli. SCHUBERT-LISZT Die junge Nonne, D 828; Erlkönig, D 328. SCHUBERT-REINECKE-KATSARIS Symphony No. 8, “Unfinished.” DIABELLI Sonatine, op. 151/1; Sonatine, op. 168/6; Sonatine, op. 168/7; Waltz. BEETHOVEN-DIABELLI String Quintet movement


In certain ways, these two enterprising and imaginative collections are polar opposites. Viennese Connections gathers together music by four composers all working in a given place at a given time (Biedermeier Vienna) in order to give us a rich and detailed sense of the texture of a particular artistic ethos. Album d’un Voyageur , in contrast, wanders over three centuries and 16 countries apparently in order to give us some sense of the broad range within which musical nationalism can operate. In many other ways, though, they fit together well. Both interleave “serious” art with more “popular” works, original works with transcriptions and adaptations, canonical items with pieces you’re liable never to have heard before. (Among the rarities is Petyrek’s setting of a Ukrainian folk song, Zu Pressburg an der Donau , with an astonishing similarity to the theme of Alkan’s Festin d’Esop. ) And both collections are performed with the refreshing intelligence, wit, legerdemain, and variety of utterance that mark Katsaris’s maturity.


There’s no space for (nor profit in) a detailed account of each of the dozens and dozens of pieces on display here. Suffice it to say that from the granitic solidity of the Schubert-Liszt Die junge Nonne to the heartfelt sweetness of Strauss’s An einsamer Quelle , from the zest of the Diabelli sonatinas (their conventionality overridden by the pianist’s relish) to the graciousness of the Liszt Allegro Pastorale, from the utter simplicity of Eller’s Andantino to the key-smashing exuberance of Schütt’s Strauss paraphrase (a welcome alternative to the Schulz-Evler), Katsaris gives us an all-embracing tour. And while even he can’t quite convince me that the few harmonic swerves make Hüttenbrenner’s otherwise foursquare op. 2 Variations worth resurrecting, virtually everything else here brings its special pleasures.


High points? The “Unfinished” Symphony, where Katsaris brings out the splinters in Reinecke’s rough-hewn transcription to excellent effect (although I do wish, if only for historical accuracy, that he had given us Reinecke unadorned, rather than adding his own embellishments); Albert Harris’s deliciously tacky paean to Warsaw, played with just the right self-consciousness to keep it from turning tasteless; Liszt’s transcription of Erlkönig , a torrential onslaught that reminds us that Katsaris, for all his mellowing, has not lost the virtuoso smash of his earlier days; Finlandia , which starts with such a growl and continues with such monumental assurance that you hardly miss the orchestra; Jaëll’s Traviata paraphrase, decked with such finely wrought glitter that the music’s gestural banality barely registers. But that’s just this week’s list; the playing is so committed and so consistently inspired, and the music is so varied, that I’m sure with next week’s turn of the kaleidoscope, new favorites will emerge.


The production values are excellent. The Viennese album was recorded in the studio in 2009; the pieces in Album d’un Voyageur were taped at 10 different venues (some during live performances) over more than a decade, but everything emerges with immediacy and impact. And the notes for both albums, in English, French, and German, are extensive and detailed—sufficiently so that, once you’ve taken out the booklet, you may find it difficult to get it back into the jewel case. Warmly welcomed.


FANFARE: Peter J. Rabinowitz