Naxos
Liszt: Transcriptions And Arrangements / Soyeon Kate Lee
$9.99
Details
- Composer
- LISZT, FRANZ
- Artist
- Soyeon Kate Lee
- Format
- CD
- Label
- Naxos
- Released
- Jan 28, 2014
- Catalog #
- 8572589
- UPC
- 747313258970
About
Remember Soyeon Kate Lee’s 2008 Zankel Hall recital, where she appeared in a concert gown constructed from 6000 recycled grape juice containers? Not surprisingly her outfit got more press than her actual music making, but the fact is that Lee is a splendid pianist who doesn’t need gimmicks. Her first appearance in Naxos’ complete Liszt piano music cycle attests to this.
Lee’s shapely and sonorous handling of the thick pianistic hurdles throughout Liszt’s transcription of the Sarabande and Chaconne from Handel’s Singspiel Almira holds interest in terms of technique and stamina, although the music is deadly dull. By contrast, Liszt’s paraphrase based on Gounod’s Hymne a Sainte Cecile thoroughly improves upon the original composition, where Lee’s contouring of the multi-thematic textural layers proves more pliable and forward moving than in Leslie Howard’s comparatively square (though no less sensitive) rendition.
So far as Liszt’s transcription from Joachim Raff’s forgotten opera König Alfred, Lee does not differentiate the opening Andante finale’s foreground and background material with Leslie Howard’s variety, yet she’s more animated and energetic in the subsequent Marsch. Lee also plays the Gounod transcriptions from Romeo et Juliette and La reine de Saba with a lovely lyrical sensitivity. The better known Valse from Gounod’s Faust paraphrase features scrupulous and crisply dispatched fingerwork, but the interpretation is a bit cut and dried, falling short of Jean-Yves Thibaudet’s glittery panache or the dynamic and rhythmic heft of Earl Wild and Egon Petri. However, she takes the opening section of Liszt’s transcription of Spohr’s Die Rose Romanze at a faster clip and with more vocally oriented phrasing than in Howard’s slower, more static traversal, heightening the music’s rich harmonic invention in the process. Annotations and engineering are first rate. In all, a strong entry in Naxos’ ongoing Liszt series.
-- Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com
Lee’s shapely and sonorous handling of the thick pianistic hurdles throughout Liszt’s transcription of the Sarabande and Chaconne from Handel’s Singspiel Almira holds interest in terms of technique and stamina, although the music is deadly dull. By contrast, Liszt’s paraphrase based on Gounod’s Hymne a Sainte Cecile thoroughly improves upon the original composition, where Lee’s contouring of the multi-thematic textural layers proves more pliable and forward moving than in Leslie Howard’s comparatively square (though no less sensitive) rendition.
So far as Liszt’s transcription from Joachim Raff’s forgotten opera König Alfred, Lee does not differentiate the opening Andante finale’s foreground and background material with Leslie Howard’s variety, yet she’s more animated and energetic in the subsequent Marsch. Lee also plays the Gounod transcriptions from Romeo et Juliette and La reine de Saba with a lovely lyrical sensitivity. The better known Valse from Gounod’s Faust paraphrase features scrupulous and crisply dispatched fingerwork, but the interpretation is a bit cut and dried, falling short of Jean-Yves Thibaudet’s glittery panache or the dynamic and rhythmic heft of Earl Wild and Egon Petri. However, she takes the opening section of Liszt’s transcription of Spohr’s Die Rose Romanze at a faster clip and with more vocally oriented phrasing than in Howard’s slower, more static traversal, heightening the music’s rich harmonic invention in the process. Annotations and engineering are first rate. In all, a strong entry in Naxos’ ongoing Liszt series.
-- Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com
Tracklist 8 tracks
-
1 Sarabande und Chaconne aus dem Singspiel Almira von Handel, S181/R25 12:42
- Track
- 1
- Title
- Sarabande und Chaconne aus dem Singspiel Almira von Handel, S181/R25
- Duration
- 12:42
- Composer
- Franz Liszt
- Performer
- Soyeon Kate Lee
-
2 Gounod - Hymne a Sainte Cecile, S491/R168 10:36
- Track
- 2
- Title
- Gounod - Hymne a Sainte Cecile, S491/R168
- Duration
- 10:36
- Composer
- Franz Liszt
- Performer
- Soyeon Kate Lee
-
3 Andante finale 07:22
- Track
- 3
- Title
- Andante finale
- Duration
- 07:22
- Composer
- Franz Liszt
- Performer
- Soyeon Kate Lee
-
4 Marsch 07:55
- Track
- 4
- Title
- Marsch
- Duration
- 07:55
- Composer
- Franz Liszt
- Performer
- Soyeon Kate Lee
-
5 Gounod - Les adieux, reverie sur un motif de l'opera Romeo et Juliette, S409/R169 09:06
- Track
- 5
- Title
- Gounod - Les adieux, reverie sur un motif de l'opera Romeo et Juliette, S409/R169
- Duration
- 09:06
- Composer
- Franz Liszt
- Performer
- Soyeon Kate Lee
-
6 Gounod - Les sabeennes, berceuse de l'opera La reine de Saba, S408/R167 05:40
- Track
- 6
- Title
- Gounod - Les sabeennes, berceuse de l'opera La reine de Saba, S408/R167
- Duration
- 05:40
- Composer
- Franz Liszt
- Performer
- Soyeon Kate Lee
-
7 Valse de l'opera Faust de Gounod, S407/R166 10:17
- Track
- 7
- Title
- Valse de l'opera Faust de Gounod, S407/R166
- Duration
- 10:17
- Composer
- Franz Liszt
- Performer
- Soyeon Kate Lee
-
8 Spohr - Die Rose, Romanze aus der Oper Zemir und Azor, S571/R259 04:48
- Track
- 8
- Title
- Spohr - Die Rose, Romanze aus der Oper Zemir und Azor, S571/R259
- Duration
- 04:48
- Composer
- Franz Liszt
- Performer
- Soyeon Kate Lee