Liszt: Grandes Études de Paganini (6), S. 141

Alfred Brendel exhibits a technical tour de force in his recording of Liszt’s Paganini Etudes. But it is the coupling, the rarely recorded Christmas Tree Suite, which is of historic interest as it was Brendel’s first ever recording , made at the age of 20. This release is essential listening for both lovers of Brendel and the romantic piano repertoire.

And still they come! Liszt Volume 48 is fundamentally about the Paganini Studies, and in particular features the impossibly difficult 1838 first versions of what became the Grandes Études de Paganini. Paganini's violin virtuosity was the primary catalyst for Liszt's quest to explore the limits of pianistic virtuosity, and these works, along with the 12 Transcendental Studies, are thus his definitive statements on piano technique.

Andre Watts was born in 1946 and made his concert debut when he was only 9 years old. At the age of 16, Leonard Bernstein asked him to perform Liszt’s Piano Concerto No.1. Bernstein became Watts’ mentor. This all-Liszt recital, recorded in 1986, demonstrates what a great musician and breathtaking virtuoso he is.

Born in Odessa, the pianist and conductor Boris Bloch has long been regarded as one of the most important interpreters of classical and romantic piano music. Bloch’s detailed knowledge of the piano literature of the last three centuries, his familiarity with the entire history of music and its protagonists along with his stupendous pianism and above all things his strong artistic personality form the basis for the much vaunted depth of expression, the abundance of colour, the amazing stylistic originality and the incomparable “singing tone” of his playing, manifesting themselves equally in the thougtfully composed programs of his recitals.

“The 200th birthday of Franz Liszt is a welcome opportunity for me to pay a modest yet all the more loving tribute to the one who reformed piano playing, the father of our profession, the four times visionary genius as composer, pianist, conductor and teacher and to bow before him in deep gratitude and reverence.” (Boris Bloch)

A pianist’s dream: a rare and precious testament of a great pianist’s vision (Busoni) of another’s (Liszt) work.

Very popular repertoire in extremely rare versions.

Ferruccio Busoni (1866-1924) was one of the most gifted pianists of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, as well as being a composer of considerable importance and vision. A child prodigy, he debuted at the age of 12, being quickly marked out as a piano virtuoso unlike any other. His reputation for many years rested on his remarkable transcriptions of J.S Bach, which tended to overshadow both his original compositions and his other transcriptions.

This CD contains his complete transcriptions of Liszt. The tradition of a pianist transcribing another composer’s music for his own use was time honoured when Busoni made his versions of Liszt’s music. However whereas most pianist adapted works to suit their style and technical abilities, Busoni went a step further and wrote everything down, often illuminating his choices with rational and pertinent explanations for his changes. Busoni wrote in 1909 ‘I no longer play the piano with my hands’ - his intellectual, thought provoking approach to piano playing and his interpretational genius had taken his performances and his view of the music to another level altogether. Listening to these transcriptions is the nearest we can get to hearing Liszt’s music through the eyes, ears and mind of one of the finest musicians and greatest pianists the world has seen.

“She played Liszt’s monumental B minor Sonata with enormous assurance… Relatively few pianists have the sense of architecture to organize this pianistic symphonic poem. She marshalled the sustaining power to see the music through to the end, at which point her audience not surprisingly rose to its feet.” Toronto Star (Canada)

This title continues the Goldenweiser School, the last of the three great teaching traditions to be covered in this comprehensive survey of the many great pianists who worked in Russia in the Soviet era. The bulk of the issues in THE RUSSIAN PIANO TRADITION will be divided into 'schools' which represent the three main teachers of this period - Neuhaus, Goldenweiser and Igumnov, - and their pupils.

One of the youngest pianists to be featured in this series, Victor Merzhanov is more a grand-pupil of Goldenweiser than a pupil, as his major professor was Samuil Feinberg. It seems certain though, that while studying with one of Goldenweiser's most illustrious pupils he would also have had contact with the great man. Merzhanov graduated from the Moscow conservatory in 1942 and, after war service, shared first prize in the 1945 All-Union piano competition with Sviatoslav Richter. He began teaching at the Moscow Conservatoire in 1947 and, at the age of 90, continues to teach and serve on competition juries today.

Merzhanov quickly became renowned as a Rachmaninov interpreter and his recording of the Third Concerto is one of the greatest, he also made the first recording of Prokofiev's Sixth Sonata. He was most prolific in the recording studio in the 1950's and his performances are characterised by peerless technique (witness the Liszt 'Paganini' Studies included here) and a generous, but never self-serving, emotional involvement with the music. Once again the quality of the playing revealed here shows that our view of who are the 'greats' of Soviet pianism has been very much dictated by those performers who had careers in the west. As this series of CDs has shown, Gilels and Richter were not isolated peaks; the likes of Oborin, Zak, and here, Merzhanov, were certainly their musical equals.