Scriabin: 24 Preludes, Sonatas 4 & 10

“Exquisitely shaded and beautifully characterised Scriabin performances here” --BBC Music Magazine, December 2010 *****

The coolly flawless Mikhail Pletnev seemed an odd match for Scriabin when this recording was released in 1997, but the recording was very successful and made a good candidate for reissue by Virgin Classics in its budget-priced series in 2010. For those who prize Scriabin for his shadowy mysticism, this may be a little dry. Pletnev trims back the hazy exterior from Scriabin's music, and what he finds is that the layer underneath is equally lovely and quite rigorous.

The program is divided into three parts: the Chopin-like but restless 24 Preludes, Op. 11, the Piano Sonatas No. 4 and No. 10, and a group of short pieces from the mid-1900s decade, roughly contemporaneous with The Poem of Ecstasy. Pletnev picks out the moments of tension and experimentation in the preludes, and his Piano Sonata No. 10 matches Scriabin's own sublimely bizarre description of the work: "The insects are born of the sun which nourishes them. They are kisses of the sun, like my Tenth Sonata." If you've heard a really gloriously murky performance of Scriabin and fallen in love, sample Pletnev's scalpel-like readings before buying, but like so much of this pianist's output they're very stimulating. Concise but very informative booklet notes are in English, French, and German. --allmusic.com

Debussy: Nocturnes; Ravel: Daphnis Et Chloe Suite No. 2, Pavane; Scriabin

It seems that at some point DG made some of its best recordings with the Boston Symphony and a wide variety of guest conductors: Abbado, Tilson Thomas, Steinberg, Bernstein, and Jochum. The performances collected here are wonderful. The BSO has always been acclaimed in French repertoire, and at this point in his career Abbado had not yet turned into the fussy micromanager that he is now (at least most of the time). And Scriabin also is French, to the extent that he’s anything at all.

This version of the Nocturnes is certainly the best by this orchestra, and one of the best by anyone. Consider the opening of Fêtes: perfect tempo, ideal transparency of texture, and bright trumpets that provide power without stridency (sound clip). These qualities grace the two Ravel items equally, and work equally well. The Daphnis Second Suite, alternately poetic and exciting, with its chorus parts intact, also ranks with the best on disc.

As for the Poem of Ecstasy, a work you either love or hate, it proceeds in a seamless arch of opulent excess, from mysterious opening to the concluding blast of sound. DG’s remastered sonics are very good–not state of the art for today, perhaps a touch dry, but a slightly lean sonority suits the music well, even the Scriabin (especially if you have a low tolerance for schmaltz). A great collection. --David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Sonatas & Etudes

“…22-year-old Yuja Wang is a wondrously gifted pianist whose debut album… suggests a combination of blazing technique and a rare instinct for poetry. In Scriabin's Second Sonata she is beautifully sensitive to the moods, whether tranquil and starlit or tempestuous, reflecting the composer's love of the Baltic Sea. She is fiery but never reckless in Chopin's Second Sonata... As a crowning touch her Ligeti Etudes are both musicianly and dazzlingly incisive. In the words of the publicist, "a star is born".” --Gramophone Magazine, August 2009

“The opening movement of Chopin’s Second Sonata certainly identifies qualities of youthful impetuosity, power and dexterity.” --The Telegraph, 25th June 2009 ***

“The Scriabin (sonata no 2) flows nicely; in the Liszt B minor sonata she’s no empty virtuoso. A talent worth watching.” --The Times, 23rd May 2009 ****

“…Yuja Wang… has all the equipment to be one of the most exciting pianists of her generation. As well as a stunning technique she has a fabulous range of sonority and colour… the two Ligeti Etudes, especially 'Fanfares', suit her dazzling fingerwork perfectly. Pianistically, parts of her Liszt Sonata are extraordinary, with blistering octaves, razor-sharp articulation and a wonderful tonal richness.” --BBC Music Magazine, July 2009 ****

Live at the Royal Albert Hall

“there's an admirable lightness of touch and appreciation of rhythmic flow to her "Für Elise", and her negotiation of Liszt's "Un Sospiro" is captivating.” --The Independent, July 2012 ****

“genuine gifts for lyricism and dazzling display...those musical gifts quickly hit the ears on this closely recorded CD.... Track three is Liszt’s La campanella, intelligently shaped, its bell sounds glittering as rarely before...Lisitsa tends to play with the lights fully on, with not enough shading in the wide expanse between loud and quiet. This gets rather tiring...But at the moment there is only one Valentina Lisitsa.” --The Times, July 2012

Born in Kiev, Ukraine, Valentina began playing the piano at the age of three and performed her first solo recital just one year later. She has won prestigious awards for her playing internationally, including the Murray Dranoff Two Piano Competition (together with her husband Alexei Kuznetsoff).

Valentina Lisitsa has already performed at major international venues including Carnegie Hall and Avery Fisher Hall in New York and the Vienna Musikverein, and in countries as far apart as the Netherlands and Brazil. She has played with renowned orchestras including Chicago Symphony, Seattle Symphony, San Francisco Symphony and the Pittsburgh Symphony, collaborating with conductors Manfred Honeck, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, and Jukka-Pekka Saraste, among others. Upcoming performances are confirmed with the Rotterdam Philharmonic, Philharmonie im Gasteig, Munich with Münchner Symphoniker and recitals at the Victoria Hall in Geneva and Philharmonie in Berlin.

With more than 43 million views and over 52,000 subscribers to her YouTube channel, the young pianist is not only one of the fastest-rising stars of the international concert scene but probably the single most-watched classical musician, having rapidly overtaken long-established giants of the piano world in terms of global online viewing figures.

Tchaikovsky, Scriabin: Piano Concertos

BEST OF THE YEAR, BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE
BEST CONCERTO RECORDING OF THE YEAR, CLASSIC CD

'A major achievement' --Classic CD

“Demidenko offers a blazing yet superbly-controlled account of the Tchaikovsky No. 1. And this is the best available version of Sciabin's youthful, Chopinesque Concerto.” BBC Music Magazine, January 2008 *****

“The chief attraction here is the unusual coupling which pairs two sharply opposed examples of Russian Romanticism, and although the reasons for the neglect of Scriabin's Piano Concerto aren't hard to fathom (its lyrical and decorative flights are essentially inward-looking), its haunting, bittersweet beauty, particularly in the central Andante, is hard to resist. Demidenko's own comments, quoted in the accompanying booklet, are scarcely less intense and individual than his performance: 'in the ambience, phrasing and cadence of his music we meet with a world almost without skin, a world of nerve-ends where the slightest contact can bring pain.' His playing soars quickly to meet the music's early passion head on, and in the first più mosso scherzando he accelerates to produce a brilliant lightening of mood.

His flashing fortes in the Andante's second variation are as volatile as his pianissimos are starry and refined in the finale's period reminiscence, and although he might seem more tight-lipped, less expansive than Ashkenazy on Decca, he's arguably more dramatic and characterful. Demidenko's Tchaikovsky, too, finds him ferreting out and sifting through every texture, forever aiming at optimum clarity. While this is hardly among the greatest Tchaikovsky Firsts on record, it's often gripping and mesmeric. The recorded balance isn't always ideal and the piano sound is sometimes uncomfortably taut.” --Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

'It is something of an achievement when one manages to hear afresh such an over-familiar work' --BBC Music Magazine

'Demidenko's inspirational account of the (Scriabin) Concerto is in a class of its own' --Classic CD

MP3 320 · 141 MB