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| DG The Originals (Mid price) (CD) 447 420-2GOR (71 minutes: ADD). Item marked a from SLPM138076 (1/60), b SLPM138822 (1/63). |
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Here are two classic performances lovingly refurbished in DG's The Originals series. No more aristocratic recording of either concerto exists and time and again Richter has a way of making comparisons more irrelevant than odious. Of course Richter would not be Richter if there were not a touch of enigma or, to put it another way, a refusal of all indulgence or egotism. Yet it is surely this abstinence combined with a transcendental pianistic command that gives these performances their crowning touch. In the opening pages of the Rachmaninov Richter effortlessly penetrates what is so often an opaque orchestral texture and, throughout, his widely fluctuating tempos never endanger continuity of line or phrase. The finale is truly Allegro scherzando, taken at a cracking pace and without even a fractional easing for the always tricky principal subject. Listen to his rocket-like ascent at 3'57" or his gloriously assuaging lyricism in the following Moderato. The final pages, too, have rarely sounded more maestoso so that, all in all, you may well feel that you are hearing Rachmaninov played by the greatest of all pianists.
Richter's Tchaikovsky is, if anything, even more intriguing. Aided and abetted by Karajan's often portentous partnership (similar to that offered in his other discs with Weissenberg, Berman and Kissin) he somehow maintains his sovereign identity, particularly when allowed free rein. Who else could bring an almost visionary poetry to the cadenza or spin off the central Andantino with such deceptive ease and delicacy? The recordings may date from 1959 and 1962 respectively but the performances are in a class of their own.
BM