Tchaikovsky: Concert Fantasy, Op. 56

The Romantic Piano Concerto series reaches Volume 50. This series has been described as a jewel in Hyperion’s crown and one of the glories of the recording industry. Rarely in the history of recorded music has such a rich seam of undiscovered delights been mined to such consistently dazzling effect. These first fifty volumes include 131 works for piano and orchestra: fifty-nine of these works are premiere recordings and many other featured works have only been recorded once before. The performers include some of the greatest pianists, orchestras and conductors in the world, and each disc in itself is a miracle of virtuosity, scholarship and musicianship.

For Volume 50, a stellar cast has been assembled for a two-disc set that includes, unusually, one of the most famous concertos in the repertoire. Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No 1 has certainly achieved warhorse status—but in the expert hands of Stephen Hough it is a new creature. With the rest of this fascinating two-disc set we are in more usual RPC territory, with music which is actually not widely known. This is a complete survey of Tchaikovsky’s music for piano and orchestra and includes alternative versions of the second movement of Piano Concerto No 2 as well as some delicious extras.

Stephen Hough performed all four concertos at the BBC Proms in 2009 and was described as ‘the epitome of a “golden age” virtuoso with his balletic elegance and dazzling rhythmic reflexes’ (The Independent). Armed with this inestimably important experience, he travelled to Minnesota to record the set live with the Minnesota Orchestra under their acclaimed conductor Osmo Vänskä. The result is a set of unique importance: a winning combination of a pianist at the zenith of his artistry, a world-class orchestra and director, a pre-eminent producer and engineer, repertoire both familiar and unknown, and packaged with even more than the usual care that customers have come to expect from Hyperion.

“Idil Biret was one of the greatest (child) prodigies of the 20th century. Her recital at the Boston Conservatory on Tuesday night demonstrated that she is no less prodigious today. She played a long and demanding program with the power, concentration and pouncing instincts of a crouching tiger…This is the kind of playing that makes reservations irrelevant; there is no one like her which is what defines a unique artist.” Richard Dyer Boston Globe USA Sept. 2000 & Nov. 2005

2 CDs for 1

This marvelous two disc set brings back into the catalogue Jerome Lowenthal's superb readings of all four of the works that Tchaikovsky wrote for piano and orchestra.

The recordings focus on Tchaikovsky's original, uncut scores in virtuoso performances by Lowenthal, accompanied by the London Symphony Orchestra, directed by the late Sergiu Comissiona.

The recordings, made in the late 1980s, were originally released on Arabesque. Both discs have been re-mastered for this release by Grammy-winning engineer, Adam Abeshouse.

Today Nikolayeva (1924-1993) is remembered mainly as a Bach player and also as the definitive performer of Shostakovich’s 24 Preludes & Fugues, which were inspired by, and written for, her after the composer heard her play Bach in the 1950 Leipzig Bach competition (which she won). However, to limit Nikolayeva’s reputation to these two composers would be doing her a great disservice. She had a vast repertoire and her recordings include concertos by Bartok, Medtner, Prokofiev Stravinsky and several Soviet composers - including her own concerto, as she was also a composer! Further, she recorded the complete Beethoven sonatas and much other standard repertoire from the 19th century.

This CD presents two recording premieres – the first ever recording of the Tchaikovsky Concert Fantasy Op56 and the first recording of the original version of Tchaikovsky’s 2nd Piano Concerto. At the time of its premiere the work had been deemed too long and until relatively recently the work has always been performed in a drastically cut revision by the pianist Alexander Siloti. Here Nikolayeva reveals that not only was she an intellectual pianist but also a virtuoso who could ‘barnstorm’ with the best of them.