John Corigliano’s music has been commissioned, performed, and recorded by some of the most prominent orchestras, soloists, and chamber musicians in the world. He is the recipient of a Pulitzer Prize, five GRAMMY Awards, the Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition, and an Oscar. The Piano Concerto ranges in expression between lyricism and atonality and is extremely virtuosic and theatrical, while the competition piece Fantasia on an Ostinato investigates the performer’s imagination and musicality through minimalist techniques. The devilish discipline of Étude Fantasy contrasts with the improvisatory origins of Winging It, while Prelude for Paul echoes the soul of Rachmaninoff.

Listen to the Naxos Classical Spotlight Podcast about this recording!

REVIEW:

John Corigliano’s formally very free but tonally not too modern Piano Concerto from 1968 opens this program. Ravel and Bartok could both have been the inspiration for this rhythmically interesting and highly imaginative piece. Fisher and the Albany Symphony, led by David Allan Miller, deliver a ravishing interpretation of it.

Fantasia on an Ostinato combines minimalism with improvisation and is Fisher’s favorite piece.

The short, lyrical Prelude for Paul leads to the five-part Etude-Fantasy, some virtuosic and some very quiet, which begins with an etude for the left hand. The virtuosic parts sound nervous and agitated at times.

‘Winging it’ is the result of a notation of three virtuoso improvisations played brilliantly and very spontaneously by Edward Fisher.

On the whole, then, this is a very interesting CD that presents one aspect of John Corigliano’s compositions in detail and at a high level.

-- Pizzicato