“This recording project is a fabulous chance
for me to explore again and again this great
composer at the piano. I treasure every phrase.
I love every note.” Barry Douglas 2012
Barry Douglas is back! Not that he’s been away, but if you are measuring his career on solo recordings, then this is his first in a long while. The return to solo piano recording is due to Chandos records investment in him in a project to record all of Brahms and Schubert’s solo piano music. I have been a fan of Barry Douglas’s work since as a young piano student I became aware of him after he won the Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in 1986, there were many tv documentaries about him at the time and he also had his own half hour TV show on BBC2 where he would play solo works, the title music I remember well ‘Rachmaninoff Bb major prelude’. Subsequent TV appearances included ‘Concerto’ with Michael Tilson Thomas and Dudley Moore. I have been fortunate enough to see Barry Douglas play live on three occasions: Prokofiev 3rd Piano Concerto at Royal Festival Hall, Rachmaninoff 3rd Piano Concerto at St David’s hall and Bartok 2nd Piano Concerto at Brangwyn hall.
So to the new recording: The disc is fantastic value at 77+ minutes and contains a wide variety of Brahms’ works spanning all of his life. The works are not complete sets, instead Douglas has decided to programme the recording rather like a recital, concentrating on balance and variety as if one were in the concert hall with him, for this I believe he is to be commended as it gives the listener a real sense of sharing something special with the pianist, almost like being in a recital. This has however divided critics of the album:
Andrew Clements in his review in the Guardian describes it as an ‘Exasperating disc‘ and ‘disconcerting‘ due to ‘treating the sets in this piecemeal way‘ awarding the album 2 out of 5 stars.
Charlotte Gardener on the BBC website states the complete opposite: ‘the programming alone makes it one the most engaging Complete Works piano discs you could hope to own’.
I’m obviously with Charlotte on this one, I would much prefer to hear the music presented in this way rather than by opus number in order in a cold calculated way, I’m sure this leads to better preparation from the artist too, performing the works because he or she wants to, rather than, ‘I’d better record this one too as it’s next on the list’.
The performances themselves are outstanding, thoughtful with great sound and phrasing as you would expect, the interweaving counterpoint in Brahms’ work all well handled but with great attention to melody and mood. After 50 minutes of rhapsodies, intermezzos, cappricios, ballades and romances suddenly we are given a 27 minute tour de force which is the Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel, Op. 24. Completed in Hamburg in September 1861 and dedicated to Clara Schumann on her birthday, this is a huge piece consisting of 25 variations and a fugue, this work is worthy of the disc price alone in my opinion.
My only concern is how will volume two be as good as this?!
For more details on this album please visit Chandos website.
Also visit Barry Douglas’s website.
Norwegian pianist Leif Ove Andsnes has some new projects up his sleeve. The EMI artist is well known for his interpretations of Grieg, including playing some of the ‘Lyric pieces’ on Grieg’s own Steinway in Trouldhagen,he has also shown himself to be a very good accompanist, (Lieder with Ian Bostridge), and chamber musician, his most recent release being the complete piano trio music of Schumann, he has also conducted Mozart concertos from the keyboard, no easy feat, and it is to this latter skill that his next recording project will continue to display how good Andsnes is.
