Does anyone know what happened with the "lost" Granados piano concerto that was in the news a few years ago after being rediscovered by pianist/conductor Melani Mestre in 2009? According to the Spanish Wikipedia, it was performed by Mestre and the Lviv SO on 27 Oct. 2010, under Alexis Soriano, and was published by Editorial Boileau de Musica in the same year (see http://www.boileau-music.com/libro.asp?codart=B.3612&idioma=0 for Mestre's written comments about the work). A recording was planned, but all that remains available are youtube clips of Mestre speaking about his discovery. Were there any reviews of the première? (It was supposed to be performed in both Lviv and Barcelona.) Does anyone have a recording to post? Thanks.
I know it was recorded a couple of months ago in Glasgow, but I have no knowledge when it will be released.
Concertingly.
Thal
It is up and coming on the Hyperion Romantic Piano Concerto series. Should be within the next 2 or 3 releases...
Hmmm.....if I'd wager a guess, Albeniz Piano Concerto No. 1 (alas No. 2 is 'incomplete', whatever that means in this case) will be the coupling.
Just a guess of course, but it'd hardly be surprising, and at least the piece isn't over recorded.
Apparently these are also ones to look out for later in the year alsong with the Granados - Dubois, Döhler & Dreyschock
That will be the Dohler PC and the Dreyschock Concert Piece +Salut de Vienne (the latter a petit rien, but enjoyable nonetheless).
haha, finally given in has he???
Thal
I only just heard of Döhler in the last year or thereabouts myself (and because of his piano solo works). Glad to see him there too.
Quotehaha, finally given in has he???
I guess so, Thal - and I must say, I'm quite pleased - though I don't think we'll be hearing that outrageous cascade of broken octaves which Frank Cooper inserted before the last chord of Dreyschock's Concert Piece on the Genesis recording because, while entirely in character, it's not in the score. (It always made me laugh with delight because it was
so OTT!)
I'm so pleased that we'll have a modern recording of the Dreyschock. I have loved it for 40 years since buying the Genesis recording way back in 1972. Not great music, to be sure, but an absolute barn-storming charmer and it has so much more character than the disappointingly vapid Piano Concerto. I had no idea that the broken chords aren't in the score. Schade!
Frank Cooper's performance can be downloaded from our Downloads Archive here (http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,1401.msg35658.html#msg35658).
Guess we'll also get to hear the original scoring for the soloist of those clarinet arpeggios that Cooper transcribed too.
Just so, Jim. My fear is that the original version will be a disappointment after Frank Cooper's wholly sympathetic and colourful alterations.
mmmm, hadn't thought of that. Maybe it's a good job that I digitised Frank Cooper's recording.
It seems that liberty taking with the score has died out. A shame, as for me it would be at the very heart of romanticism.
I wonder if Mr Cooper had heard/played Tausig's take on the Chopin 1st PC???
Thal
Well, not entirely- Adam Fellegi takes many liberties with at least some of his Medtner recordings, for instance- but I'd have liked it if they'd mentioned that in the booklet...
QuoteIt seems that liberty taking with the score has died out. A shame, as for me it would be at the very heart of romanticism.
And particularly in this sort of piece. I bet pianist/composers like Dreyschock, Herz, etc (and even Liszt, I wouldn't be surprised to learn) hardly ever gave a "note-exact" performance but threw in embellishments and extra bits of bravura as the mood took them.
Liszt is known to have done so if not always intentionally (as when he couldn't remember the slow movement of the Kreutzer sonata and inserted a Gypsy-cadence into its main theme during performance). (I get the impression from the Walker biography I read that he did make distinctions between better and worse, more and less artistic, ways to make such adjustments and much preferred the former, likewise his attitude towards making cuts in his compositions about which Walker does sum up his attitude exactly so...)
I think I've mentioned this before, but if you haven't read Harold Shoenberg's old book "The Great Pianists- from Mozart to the Present", there are some great stories about Dreyshock, Herz, Liszt, Thalberg and others and the way the interpreted and competed, etc. One of my favorite books. Still available in paperback from Amazon.
Jerry
There is a true story about Dohnanyi in old age playing one of his piano concertos from memory and getting lost. Afterwards a woman remonstrated with him, to which he replied' I am the composer and you have just had the privilege of hearing the first performance of the revised version.'
Geirr Tveitt was notorious at 'revising' his concertos as he played them.
Still offtopic to Granados, but if that topic doesn't remind me of Enescu's 2nd piano sonata, said "by some" to be a placeholder name given him to whatever sonata he felt like improvising at a concert (or perhaps a work continually in progress that he did not write down- I may have this entirely wrong and have forgotten the right story, apologies!!) - well- nothing does...
The Granados is being released in April as Vol. 63. Coupling.... the obvious Albéniz :)
No - it'll surely be vol.63. See this new thread:
http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,4770.msg50833.html#msg50833 (http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,4770.msg50833.html#msg50833)