Hyperion's series devoted to the Romantic piano concerto reached its 68th volume with this release in 2016, its 25th year. The series has naturally been uneven, but many releases have achieved not only critical, but even commercial success, testifying to how ready audiences have been for a broadening of the repertory. This album, devoted to piano concerto works by Moritz Moszkowski and Adolf Schulz-Evler, is one of the more successful of the bunch. The Moszkowski concerto recorded here is not the Piano Concerto No. 2 in E major, Op. 59, of 1897, which has been recorded before, but a work of Moszkowski's youth, sometimes known as the Piano Concerto No. 1 in B minor, Op. 3. Moszkowski disowned the work in later years and even declined to send a copy to someone who had inquired about it because, he said, he needed it to raise the seating on his piano bench. Although Liszt liked the concerto, it disappeared and was not rediscovered until 2008; this album marks its recorded premiere. What Moszkowski disliked is easy to see: the finale is too long, is blankly sectional, and is in general not of a piece with the first three movements. Within those, however, is some marvelous music, most of all in the "Adagio" slow movement, which in its combination of harmonic sophistication (two adjacent sections juxtapose E flat major and E major without stress) and bright French melody sounds entirely unlike anything else that had been written. Moszkowski's piano style was noted for grace and smoothness rather than for athleticism, and the piano writing is a pleasure in both the Moszkowski concerto and in the shorter Russian Rhapsody of Adolf Schulz-Evler, which treads some of the some territory as the large (53-minute) Moszkowski work. The performances by pianist Ludmil Angelov and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under Vladimir Kiradjiev are fully competent, but many parts of the Moszkowski concerto are strong enough to make you wish for a pianist with star power, and for its addition to the regular performing repertory. James Manheim
Tracklist :
Piano Concerto In B Minor Op 3 (53:59)
Composed By – Moritz Moszkowski
Russian Rhapsody Op 14 (11:08)
Composed By – Andrey Schulz-Evler
Credits :
Conductor – Vladimir Kiradjiev
Leader – Laura Samuel
Orchestra – BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra
Piano – Ludmil Angelov
