How splendid of Robert Schumann to be having a year in classical music without having to die or be reborn for it. Remarkable in itself, he's never gone away, but suddenly he's everywhere. In celebration, his much-loved warhorse of a Piano Concerto has pranced by on CD four times of late, with yet another being saddled up �" and each a horse of a different color. In this piece, my heart will always belong to Martha Argerich, whose numerous recordings of it are notably consistent in interpretation. But otherwise, vive la difference. I would have thought.
First out of the gate was Alexander Melnikov with the Freiburger Barockorchster under Pablo Heras-Casado (Harmonia Mundi). He seems at his best in contemporary music and in historically informed performances (HIP) of earlier fare, and as the name of the exemplary orchestra on this recording suggests, this is HIP.
Schumann's concerto for his instrument of choice was long in the gestation because he sought one in which neither the piano nor the orchestra dominated. His eventual achievement of that balance becomes even clearer when the concerto is performed on instruments like the ones Schumann knew. Melnikov's enlightened performance, in which he plays an exquisite Erard fortepiano of 1837 (less than a decade before the concerto's premiere), demonstrates yet again that a small complement of "old" instruments arrives at a balance more naturally. And again, that less is often more.
Melnikov, who's equally confident on the modern piano, fully exploits the sonorities of this Erard. But the revelation �" even clearer in the concert DVD that comes with the CD �" is the finely detailed way Melnikov partners, in sequence, with the orchestra's instrumentalists. I've never before heard more of the music of this concerto, its pointed interactions, and now I won't be inclined to settle for less.
In this unofficial Schumann year, Harmonia Mundi has been releasing all three Schumann concertos, each coupled with one of the string trios, also on historically appropriate instruments, with violinist Isabelle Faust and cellist Jean-Guihen Queryas, the wonderful final volume of which has just ben released. They're more than just breaths of fresh air; they're game-changers.
I didn't know there was such an extreme other end to the spectrum until I heard Jan Lisiecki's new recording with the Orchestra of Rome's National Academy of St. Cecilia under its director Antonio Pappano (DG). I prefer taking my "classical" music neat and am more often than not horrified by its use in movies. Take, as Exhibit A, the mortification of Rach 2 (the piano concerto, not the symphony, but let's not even go there) in Clint Eastwood's Hereafter, where it's souped up �" recomposed, really, then looped �" for maximum treacle, in which stream it already dangles a worrisome number of toes.
So goes Lisiecki's Schumann Concerto, a gauzy, woozy thing, pulled every which way and at times barely recognizable. Same goes for the fillers, out-of-the-way Schumann solo-piano music plus a creepy little "Traeumerei." I've been a big Lisiecki fan and hope to be next time. May he not be the next Yundi.
Out gay pianist Stephen Hough has never been a middle-of-the-road artist, but his new recording of the Schumann (Hyperion) falls pretty much midway on the spectrum between Melnikov's and Lisiecki's. Hough and his exemplary conductor, Andris Nelsons, here with his "old" band, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, establish and maintain a dialogue as intimate as their HIP counterparts, much of it surpassingly tender. Hough is a shade less instinctive with the piece than Argerich (but then who isn't?), yet there's a keen balance of discipline and daring in his strongly individual playing. The rhythmic elasticity is as great as it could be without violating the score, lending the whole piece a sense of suspense that flies in the face of any platitudes about it.
The attention is more on its companion piece, Dvorak's G-minor Piano Concerto �" the one, once heard, audiences wonder why they don't hear more often. The short answer is that its pianistic challenges have to do with the way the music lies, or doesn't, in players' hands. Rather like Schumann, Dvorak wasn't as good a pianist as he wanted to be, limiting his own road-testing of his concerto.
Among recordings, comparisons are usually made with the two by Sviatoslav Richter, neither of which, for different reasons, is ideal. If it's precedent you're after, look no farther than the several beautiful performances on YouTube by the Czech pianist Rudolf Firkusny, who can be heard both in the "bad old" revision by Vilem Kurz (which sought to smooth over the difficulties, yet is actually quite fetching on its own, fanciful terms), and in Dvorak's original, which again holds sway today.
Hough is not shy of his own virtuosity, but he doesn't lead with it and weighs in instead with his trademark pellucid clarity, no mean achievement in this onslaught of notes. There's not the undertow of bewitching Slavic melancholy, but Hough wisely substitutes for it a forthright sense of the real majesty of the music while also indulges its voluptuousness, playfulness and charm. Important as this bold new recording is, Hough has done the concerto the additional boon of touring with it. Advocacy like his is exactly what the piece wants.