SearchsearchUseruser

Tchaikovsky: The Seasons, Grand Sonata - Kempf

Tchaikovsky: The Seasons, Grand Sonata - Kempf

BIS  BIS-2140 SACD

Stereo/Multichannel Hybrid

Classical - Instrumental


Tchaikovsky: The Seasons, Op. 37a; Grand Sonata in G major, Op. 37

Freddy Kempf, piano


Peter Tchaikovsky composed one of the most popular piano concertos in the repertory, but in solo recital programmes his name is rarely seen. Although little known, his solo piano music can nevertheless be surprisingly rewarding. It includes two large-scale sonatas – a youthful work in C sharp minor, and the Grand Sonata in G major recorded here – and a large number of mainly short pieces published either singly or as collections throughout the composer's life. This type of work was profitable for composer and publishers, and an indication of the relative commercial value comes from a letter in which Tchaikovsky offers his publisher the Grand Sonata for only 50 roubles, but asks 240 roubles for the twenty-four little pieces of his Children’s Album, Op. 39. A work of big, public gestures, the sonata is anything but childish and to a large extent Tchaikovsky keeps the lyrical ideas that came so naturally to him firmly under control.

In contrast, lyricism was given free rein two years earlier, in the twelve pieces that make up The Seasons. They were the result of a commission for a series of piano pieces to appear in a monthly St Petersburg journal. Some ten years after the serial publication in the journal the pieces appeared in print as a collection which has become Tchaikovsky’s best-known solo piano music. As with much of his work in this genre, the ultimate model is Schumann: January, for example, combines hints of Schumannesque Innigkeit with Tatiana’s music in Eugene Onegin. With the present recording Freddy Kempf, who made his acclaimed début recording with Schumann's Carnaval and has gone on to demonstrate his versatility in programmes taking in Bach as well as Liszt and Stravinsky, now adds Tchaikovsky to his discography.

Support this site by purchasing from these vendors using the paid links below.
As an Amazon Associate HRAudio.net earns from qualifying purchases.

bol.com
 
jpc
Presto

 

Add to your wish list | library

 

4 of 4 recommend this, would you recommend it?  yes | no

All
show
Recording
show
hide
PCM recording

Recorded in November 2014 at Bavaria Studios, Munich, Germany, 24/96

Producer and sound engineer: Jens Braun (Take5 Music Production)

Piano technician: Christian Rabus

Piano: Grand Piano: Fazioli F 278

Recording equipment: BIS’s recording teams use microphones from Neumann and Schoeps, audio electronics from RME, Lake People and DirectOut, MADI optical cabling technology, monitoring equipment from B&W, STAX and Sennheiser, and Sequoia and Pyramix digital audio workstations.

Post-production: Editing and mixing: Jens Braun

Executive producer: Robert Suff
Reviews (1)
show
hide

Review by Adrian Quanjer - January 31, 2016

This is the first recording of Tchaikovsky’s piano sonata Op. 37 in Super Audio. And even in RBCD there are only few. No wonder, because this ‘Grand Sonata’ is neither easy for the artist, nor the listener, and Tchaikovsky apparently had difficulties with it, too. He put it aside for a while, preferring to finish his violin concerto first.

It takes a pianist of phenomenal technical skill to render musically consumable what sometimes looks to the inexperienced listener nothing but a bag full of notes. Freddy Kempf is such a talent. He joins the small group of eminences like Sviatoslav Richter and Mikhail Pletnev, as well as, more recently, the young and promising talent, Joseph Moog.

Sure, there are more who can play it, but the point is that technical skill alone is not enough. The intrinsic value of the Grand Sonata is so much more than that. Its complicated and often thick structure hides a lyrical undercurrent, filled with personal feelings, surfacing from time to time, notably, but not exclusively, in the second movement. As John Broggio so eloquently pointed out in his review of Balakirev, Ravel, Mussorgsky - Kempf, Kempf has moved up the ladder from a ‘great technician to a great musician’.

Tchaikovsky may have sputtered and grumbled in dissatisfaction while composing his Grand Opus; fact is that the first public performance under the hands of Nikolai Rubinstein (Anton’s brother) turned out to be a great success, not in the least because he was an eminent player. This, then, is the magical crux for not only performing, but also enabling musical appreciation by the listener of this not always easy to follow sonata. Kempf succeeds on all counts.

Interestingly, the disk cover lists the ‘The Seasons’ first, though it is second in its programme. The liner notes recall that in his time, Tchaikovsky offered for sale his Grand Sonata for 50 roubles, whereas the in his eyes more commercially attractive pieces like ‘Children’s Album’ totaled 300 roubles asking price. I’m not suggesting that a similar commercial motive has played a role here. One might, indeed, argue that with almost 40 minutes against 26 minutes for the sonata, Seasons is the major work. Moreover, the idea that in terms of chronology Op. 37 a (Seasons) comes after Op. 37 (Grand Sonata), is not correct: Seasons was composed about two years earlier.

The two opus numbers may suggest, as Tchaikovski’s publisher Jurgenson wants us to believe, that there is an association between the two, but there is no information to corroborate this. Be that as it may, the twelve pieces making up the Seasons, or ‘Les Saisons’ (as the original title is in French) are the Sonata’s opposite. They were composed ‘to order’, allowing a confirmed amateur to play them as well. However, the fact that they are not very demanding may pose a major difficulty to devilishly technical pianists like Kempf, in that they could easily be tempted to get more drama out of them than had purposely been put into it, risking damaging its positive ‘simplicity’. Fortunately Kempf does not; he ably preserves its friendly and entertaining character. The twelve pieces relate to the months of the year and each of them was, when published for the first time, accompanied by a poetic epigraph, the texts of which are to be found in the booklet.

Associated or not, performing both contrasting compositions as Freddy Kempf does, gives us a superior insight in how he has developed over the years into a major player on the international keyboard.

The (surround) sound is realistically captured and recorded in 24-bit/96 Khz.

Blangy-le Château
Normandy, France

Copyright © 2016 Adrian Quanjer and HRAudio.net

Performance:

Sonics (Multichannel):

stars stars