Szymanowski N

12 Etudes,Op. 33 - 20 Mazurkas,Op. 50 - No. 13, Moderato;No. 15, Allegretto dolce;No. 14, Animato;No. 16, Allegramente_Vigoroso Sonata for Piano No 1,Op. 8 - 4 Polish Dances,Op. 47 - Prelude and Fugue
Martin Roscoe pf

Naxos     8 553867 (69 minutes : DDD)

Reviewed: Gramophone (10/2000)
A warm welcome to the third instalment in Martin Roscoe's Szymanowski survey but regret that no more is to come 
 
Somewhat surprisingly, Naxos has announced that this third volume concludes Martin Roscoe's cycle of Szymanowski's piano music. A pity: I should like to have heard his account of the Third Sonata and the remaining six Mazurkas. Still, this is a distinguished survey – if not an exhaustive one – and Volume 3 offers something of a cross-section of Szymanowski's styles as a composer for the keyboard, from the very early First Sonata (always described as post-Chopin and post-Scriabin but, Roscoe convincingly demonstrates, no less importantly post-Liszt as well) to the pungent Mazurkas, with their flavour of Bartok as well as of late Grieg.
The Prelude and Fugue is an interesting link between that early Sonata (the rather Lisztian fugue was written shortly after it, the harmonically more adventurous prelude four years later) and the Op 33 Etudes which are usually referred to as representing Szymanowski's 'impressionist' phase. Again, Roscoe makes you question this conventional description: yes, the harmonies look rather Debussyan but they don't often sound that way. These very brief pieces (just over a minute on average) are studies in the conventional sense, written by one fine pianist for another, Alfred Cortot, but they are also exercises in harmonic subtlety and rich in Szymanowski's personal fantasy. The Four Polish Dances inhabit the same world as the Mazurkas, and it's obvious that Roscoe enjoys open fifths and flat sevenths as much as Szymanowski did.
A warm recommendation, then, though tinged with regret. For a complete edition of Szymanowski's piano music Martin Jones's survey on Nimbus is admirable, though a good deal dearer than Roscoe's discs, and I much prefer Naxos's piano sound. Since I'd hate to be without the Third Sonata and the remaining Mazurkas I'd supplement Roscoe's three volumes with Pavel Kamasa's superb recording of the complete Mazurkas on Koch Schwann (4/97) and Raymond Clarke's of the Third Sonata on Athene (9/99)."
 
Michael Oliver