Mendelssohn: Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 2; Violin Concerto

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Free Music Notes for Mendelssohn: Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 2; Violin Concerto

Free Music Review: RESURRECTIONIST
Hit: 5 Stars

Such recovery as the piano concertos have made in popular interest probably happened about 35 years ago. I was listening in a semi-attentive way to a BBC radio record review in which the presenter mentioned that his enthusiasm had been reawakened by a new recording, a sequence from which he played for us. There was some brisk right-hand work followed by a darting downward thrust of the left and I knew in one instant 'Serkin'. He was then the height of fashion, before the Russians hit the scene, and his style was near the top of the consciousness of many classical music enthusiasts at the time.

His approach still seems to be the favoured approach insofar as the pieces can be described as favoured at all. Broadly it can be described as 'take the outer movements as fast as human fingers can traverse a keyboard', and that is the way the youngsters are going at these concertos. Some years later Perahia took a very different approach, less hammer-and-tongs, more as one would expect Perahia to approach anything, all refinement, smoothness and urbanity. It is a beautiful record, I own it, but it has not established a new school. Serkin still rules in this slightly obscure little kingdom. Those who know his work will know that there was a lot more to him than hammer-and-tongs virtuosity, which in fact seems to have been what made Mendelssohn's own performances of the works notable too. That peculiar burning cantabile is here at its most intense, and of course so is his unique and inimitable rhythmic poise.

In fact I am myself ever so slightly lukewarm as regards Mendelssohn's piano concertos, but I am also perfectly convinced that they do not deserve the obscurity that has befallen them when certain productions by Tch**k*vsky, L*szt and the infinitesimal Gr**g still pull the crowds. Record-collectors of refined taste and informed sensibility ought to spend a few bucks on them, this set and Perahia's too.

As for the violin concerto, the number of outstanding performances that I have heard is as the sands of the sea without number. I don't recall a better one than this by Stern, who incidentally has done the best Brahms concerto I know, which is saying a lot. If you already own one, or two, or twenty-five superlative versions you can afford to miss this one. The piano concertos I suggest are nothing so optional.

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