Scriabin: Preludes, Op. 67 (2)

“Brighton-born, Moscow-trained Yuri Paterson-Olenich shows real understanding of Scriabin's visionary music, including one of the weirdest sonatas, the Seventh. What he lacks in sheer volume he makes up for in poetic dreaminess, though textures are always clear.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2000

“Paterson-Olenich shows a deep understanding of this music.” Diapason

“Time and again he allows one to savour every aspect of Scriabin’s neurotic sensibility...playing with spaciousness and lucidity, never whirled into obscure agitation by the composer’s idiosyncratic directionsPaterson-Olenich has contributed his own lively and informed essay, and the recordings...are excellent. An exceptional, very personal issue.” Gramophone Magazine, August 2001

“The intensity with which Paterson-Olenich conveys Scriabin’s vision is, on several of the tracks, unrivalled in recent recordings. Several performances really stand out; I was impressed by the austerity and poise of the Prelude, op.67 No.1, the brilliance and range of colour employed in the Op.65 Studies and Vers la flamme, the dark intensity of the Ninth Sonata. This disc is a testament to Paterson-Olenich’s affinity with Scriabin’s late music.” International Piano, September/October 2001

“The first recording from this new label brings a powerfully expressive recital of Scriabin's most searching works, including the "White" and "Black" Masses, Piano Sonata No.10 and Vers la flamme. The young Brighton-born pianist tackles them all with astonishing assurance: a most auspicious début.” The Independent, 9th September 2000

“Paterson-Olenich, born in Brighton in 1974, is a Russian-trained pianist who makes light of Scriabin’s fiendishly difficult scores. He does not quite match those volcanic outbursts of the great Scriabin pianists, though he is superb in the delicate sonorities of the Poems.” Yorkshire Evening Post

“A starry pianistic line-up give their all in Scriabin's microcosmic soundworlds, highlighted by Gavrilov's Fourth, Trpceski's Fifth and Pletnev's Tenth sonatas, alongside Ogdon's hypnotic Vers la flamme.” BBC Music Magazine, May 2011 ****

“Sciabin's late piano pieces remain among the most revolutionary ever written for the instrument. These Morceaux, Poèmes, Danses and Préludes certainly call for a player of unusual insight… with the requisite technical command to give substance to the insubstantial. In all this Crossley succeeds admirably...” BBC Music Magazine, August 2008 *****

“Virtuoso ease and well modulated, evenly balanced sonorities have always marked Paul Crossley's way with repertoire that fuses thorny and sensual elements.” Gramophone Magazine, Awards Issue 2008

“Naxos has turned up trumps with the little-known Russian Evgeny Zarafiants. Rhythmically subtle (and continually supple), tonally expansive and dramatically wide-ranging, he plays this music with great conviction, and a technique which copes conformably with all challenges. Even in the most tempestuous and tortuous passages, his tone is never strident, and his harmonic colouring could profitably be emulated by many pianists of ten times his renown. This release can be highly recommended, not least for the excellent recorded sound.” BBC Music Magazine

“With this second volume Evgeny Zarafiants completes his superb survey of Scriabin's 86 Preludes, adding four Preludes by Julian Scriabin, the composer's precociously gifted son, as encores. Listening to music of such morbid and refined intricacy played with the finest musical poise and commitment returns us to Stravinsky's bemused question, 'Scriabin, where does he come from, and who are his followers?' Is the angst and angry convolution of, say, Op 27 No 1 a slavonic memory of Brahms's Op 118 No 1? Does the explosive whimsy of Op 35 No 3 take its cue from the Scherzo of Beethoven's Op 26 Sonata? The hair-raising presto of Op 67 No 2 recalls the menace and enigma of the finale from Chopin's Op 35 Sonata, while the terse and belligerant Op 33 No 3 looks ahead to Stravinsky's sharpest modernist utterances. Yet if there are countless examples of reflection and prophecy, there are still more of the most startling originality.
Scriabin is always Scriabin, and as he journeys from Op 22 to Op 74 into the darkest reaches of the imagination you're reminded that this is hardly music for the faint-hearted.
Once again, Zarafiants is equal to each and every vivid occasion. Whether in the fragrant grazioso of Op 22 No 2, where the line twists and turns like so much honeysuckle, in the toppling argument of Op 31 No 3, or in the sauvage belliqueux of Op 59 No 2, he's richly responsive, his playing alive with a rare pianistic skill and imaginative brio. The Brandon Hill recordings are resonant and full-blooded.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Obsessive patterns, harmonies and intervals seem to spin in interstellar space… This is an invaluable issue and a formidable achievement finely recorded.” Gramophone Magazine, May 2008

“Maria Lettberg can withstand comparison with the most exalted company. She is completely attuned to the hyper-refined sensibility and ecstatic rapture of Scriabin's world...Strongly recommended.” Penguin Guide, 2011 edition