Phonograph Monthly Review, Vol. 5, No. 5 (1931-02)

150 The Phonograph Monthly Review A Survey of Recorded Pianists By HARRY L. ANDERSON T HE matter of summarizing even such a comparatively limited field in the arts as recorded pianism is one that necessarily leaves room for differences of opinion. There- fore, no apology is offered for the exclusion or inclusion in this survey of certain names that may very well mean more or less to people of different experience. The same applies to any critical estimates, although these, I believe, comform in most cases to the large consensus. Finally, it may be mentioned that electrical recordings alone are considered, and of these, only those that have seemed outstanding or most charac- teristic of the artists. To many collectors, the fascination of the phonograph lies not only in the recording of great music, but also in the pres- ervation of different styles of performance and interpretation. The days of “execution” belong to the dim past of piano playing, but one of its exponents, the ninety-year-old Francis Plante, was recorded only two years ago (French Columbia). Age, later pianistic achievement, and overamplification have made the delicacy and polish of his youth less emphatic in recordings of his near contemporaries, Chopin, Schumann and Mendelssohn; nevertheless, for many his playing will still hold a peculiar charm of style. Vladimir de Pachmann, now eighty- one, belongs less to any definite period. Eccentric, talkative, a genius in the smaller Chopin when he wishes, he has en- livened piano playing of the last fifty years more than any other pianist. His first new H.M.V. records are uneven, with enough flashes of the divine to make them valuable. For Victor, however, there is a record of the E minor posthumous Nocturne, and two mazurkas that is one of the most beautiful of all piano discs. More of de Pachmann’s indescribable charm should be on records; if the mood were in him he might still provide an unsurpassable version of the Chopin F Minor Concerto. During the last two years of his life, Liszt had about him the most brilliant group of young pianists that has ever assembled around any teacher at one time. Ansorge, Sauer, Lamond, Rosenthal, Friedheim, Siloti, Reisenauer, Stavenhag- en, D’Albert, Liebling, etc., were the inner circle of whom the first four have been electrically recorded. Of Ansorge, an intellectual, perhaps the coupling of a Mozart Andante and a Chopin-Liszt Chant-Polonais (Parlophone) reveals best his playing; already his recent death has emphasized the value of his recording. More brilliant, a master of filigree and polish, Emil von Sauer is still one of the greatest of European pianists. His own Music Box and Liszt’s Gnomenriegen (Parlophone) might be singled out, and he has also been recorded less well by Pathe in Liszt, Chopin, and Mendelssohn. So far, no major work by him has been issued. Lamond and Beethoven are as firmly linked together as de Pachmann and Chopin, or Samuel and Bach. Whether or not one approves of his rubato, he, Schnabel, and D'Albert are that composer’s most celebrated interpreters since von Biilow. Hence it is a fine thing to have his interpretative strength in such works as the Sonatas, Op. 110 in A Flat, Op. 31, No. 2, in D Minor. Of Liszt he has recorded brilliantly a number of unhackneyed original works and operatic transcriptions. The greatest active pupil of Liszt to- day, however, is Moriz Rosenthal, whose records should be more accessible to American buyers. One of the most beautiful of all Chopin records, two etudes and four preludes for Edison, is no longer available. His Debussy Reflections on the Water and Albeniz Triana (Parlophone) is unimportable; the same may apply to his latest records from Chopin. There re- mains a shimmering, miraculous transcription of The Blue Vladimir de Pachmann (from a caricature by Dr. Ricardo M. Aleman) Danube and other Strauss Waltzes (Electrola) that every piano record collector should own. One may hope that his unequalled brilliancy in the Liszt E Flat Concerto, his poetry in the Chopin E Minor, and the power of his intellect in the later Beethoven, may be chosen for future recording. Also of Liszt vintage is the Belgian, Arthur De Greef, who gives authentic and zestful versions of the Liszt Hungarian Fantasie (Victor), and the G Minor (H.M.V.) and A Minor (Victor) Concertos of his friends, Saint-Saens and Grieg, as well as smaller works by the latter. A different tradition is continued by Fanny Davies, who has recorded with sound and beautiful artistry the Schumann Concerto and Davidsbund - lert'dnze (Columbia), and the Kinderscenen (English Colum- bia) . Any more records by her of this composer or of Brahms, whom she championed in England, will be extremely valuable. Of the same generation is Max von Pauer, son and pupil of Ernst Pauer, who plays very beautifully in the Schubert “Trout” Quintet (Polydor). Forty years have left the glamor of Paderewski unchanged, his greatness as an artist perhaps sublimated, but undiminished. With the years his conceptions have enlarged, sometimes transcending the realm of mere piano playing into a world of their own. Rather curiously, the record that conveys this most is the Schelling Nocturne; like Paderewski, it is in a domain apart above all others. The F Minor Ballade, B Flat Minor Sonata, and D Flat Nocturne, of Chopin, would equal, perhaps surpass it; among his records, that of Schumann’s Prophet Bird approaches it. Of the greatest importance is the rest of his list—notably Debussy’s Reflections, Chopin’s E Minor Etude, a Schubert Impromptu; nevertheless Paderewski has been strangely slighted by the phonograph. The Beethoven lion of his Appassionata, the majesty and poise of the Waldstein or of the Emperor Concerto, the transcendence of Schumann’s Symphonic Studies, the ethereal tonal beauty of the Hadyn F Minor Variations, the tremendous impulse in the great Bach and Beethoven Fugues, his own brilliant concerto, to name a few, are conceptions whose absence from records leaves a chasm in any claim to have preserved Paderewski’s art adequately. Prodigious technique has been the possession of most Russian pianists; the names Godowsky, Rachmaninoff. Hambourg, Lhevinne, and, more recently, Moiseivitch and Horowitz, are sufficient evidence. Extreme beauty of tone, freedom from any extravagance of style, impeccable taste, characterize all Godowsky’s records. It has remained for Columbia to make available the largeness of his concepts in Schumann’s Camaval, Beethoven’s u Less Adieux” Sonata, Op.81, and to a lesser extent,