Liszt: Frühlingsnacht (after Schumann, Op. 39 No. 12), S568

It took a long time before the musical establishment recognised the genius of the great Cuban pianist Jorge Bolet. It was through his recordings for Decca, starting in the ‘80s, that the world got to know Bolet’s superb interpretations of especially Liszt’s piano music. Bolet’s playing has a speaking quality in which the music unfolds in eloquent phrases and dramatic gestures in true belcanto style, maintaining the structural proportions of the music in a most natural way. Some critics say that Bolet’s Decca recordings, whilst presenting the artist in his full maturity, lack the spontaneity and brilliance of his younger years, and Piano Classics is proud to release Bolet’s Spanish Ensayo Liszt recordings, in which the young lion of the keyboard shows his abundant temperament and virtuosity in commanding performances of the fearsome Etudes d’exécution transcendante, song transcriptions and opera paraphrases.

This set is this first in a new APR series featuring pupils of the great British piano teacher, Tobias Matthay.

TOBIAS MATTHAY (1858–1945) is the greatest piano teacher Britain has produced. From the 1890s to the 1930s, first at the RAM and then also at his own school, he almost singlehandedly produced a generation of concert pianists who launched an English piano tradition. York Bowen was an early pupil, but those best remembered are a group of female pianists; Harriet Cohen, Myra Hess, Irene Scharrer and Moura Lympany, all of whom will feature in this APR series.

EILEEN JOYCE lies somewhat outside this mainstream, as she trained principally in Germany, but she did have three years of finishing studies with Matthay between 1930 and 1933.

Eileen Joyce was born in Tasmania in 1908 to poor immigrants of Irish descent. Her father was an itinerant labourer and the family soon moved to Western Australia where the young Eileen discovered the piano and, in spite of much hardship, soon developed an astonishing playing ability. Heard by Grainger and Backhaus, who both praised her, she was sent off to Germany where she studied for three years with Robert Teichmüller. She came to England in 1930 with a recommendation which led to her Proms debut in that year playing Prokofiev's Third Concerto. She also commenced her advanced studies with Matthay.

After a slow start, her career blossomed exponentially from 1933 when she made her first recording. This disc, of Paul de Schlözer's Etude Op1/2 and Liszt's La Leggierezza is still regarded as one of the most astonishing examples of virtuosity ever recorded.

From this time until 1960, when she suddenly retired from performing at the age of 52, she was one of Britain's best loved pianists.

She appeared 37 times at the Proms, gave the British premieres of both Shostakovich concertos and became known to millions as the pianist playing Rachmaninov's Second Concerto in the film 'Brief Encounter'. Her greatest recordings are from the 78rpm period and we present all of these, with the exception of her concerto performances and a few later Decca discs. Eileen was a natural pianist with a big rich sound and very fast fingers; she is at her best in the many brilliant encore type pieces she recorded but she was equally stylish (and brilliant) in Mozart and had a special affinity with the wistful nostalgia of Grieg.

Most of these recordings have never been transferred to CD before so this set is a 'must' for all enthusiasts of great piano playing from the past.