This is the first instalment
in what may eventually be a complete
Schumann cycle. The pianist is new to
me, although he has made at least one
earlier record, and so is the record
company. I must admit also that the
cover in black and white wasn’t too
inviting and the information on the
back cover and in the – well, booklet
it is not, just a folded inlay – isn’t
very informative either. We learn, however,
that the pianist, Sérgio Gallo,
has a solid musical training, that he
has performed widely, not least in the
United States, and that he is Assistant
Professor of Piano at the University
of North Dakota.
I spent quite some
time listening to Kreisleriana – both
in Gallo’s version and also to a couple
of recordings on my shelves – since
this is a favourite piece of mine and
also was Schumann’s. He dedicated it
to his friend Chopin. The title refers
to a story by E T A Hoffmann about an
eccentric chorus master named Kreisler,
and Schumann wanted to express the contrasting
moods of the story in his own music,
although it should not be regarded as
programme music. The many shifting moods
in the music, also within movements,
requires a musician with a sensitive
ear and a wealth of colours and nuances
at his or her disposal. When I first
listened to Gallo’s interpretation I
thought it was all right but it didn’t
go to my heart and it didn’t make me
sit up in my chair, which it should.
Was I negative for extra-musical reasons,
like the forbidding cover? (It isn’t
that forbidding after all and the drawing
of Kreisler is obviously by Hoffmann
himself.) I claim that I wasn’t, and
when I played my two old favourite recordings
I at once heard the differences. First
of all my comparisons have a considerably
lighter touch in several of the fast
movements, more mercurial if you like,
and also a more delicate feeling in
the slow ones. The dramatic outbursts
also often have more – drama. And then
there is the question of tempo. For
each of the eight movements Schumann
gives not only a general indication
like fast, slow, lively but he also
stresses the extremes: he writes sehr
(very) for the six middle movements
(Sehr schnell, Sehr langsam etc)
and for the first movement he writes
Äusserst bewegt (extremely
lively), which of course tells us that
he doesn’t want a middle-of-the-road
performance. And what Gallo gives us
is a middle-of-the-road version. "Safe"
you could say, but who is safe driving
in the middle of a highway, however
romantic?
My two comparisons,
the still teen-aged Hélène
Grimaud, recorded in 1988 (Denon) and
the Vienna-based Stefan Arnold on the
German Ambitus label, are both more
aware of the true nature of Schumann’s
instructions, Arnold even dangerously
so in one or two instances; the sixth
movement, Sehr langsam, is "very
slow" indeed, coming close to a
stand still. But both of them have a
much wider scope of contrasts, Arnold
the most extreme.
Looking back at my
notes on Gallo’s performance, jotted
down while listening, I read for example:
"Powerful but not elegant",
"earthbound", "energetic",
"heavier". For the second
movement, the longest of them and with
the most beautiful melody Schumann ever
wrote, the composer indicates Sehr
innig und nicht zu rasch (Very sincere
and not too fast), Grimaud is hushed
and sincere, Arnold even more and also
very flexible. Gallo, according to my
notes, "not sincere, rather eager".
The timings can give a clue: Grimaud
takes 9:08 and Arnold even longer, 10:11,
but so full of life and nuances is he
that you never for a second get the
feeling he is slow. Gallo, on the other
hand, makes it in 7:00!
After several hours
of listening my admiration for Grimaud
and Arnold is unbroken. That is not
to say that Gallo is bad; in his chosen
concept he is perfectly valid. I feel
that he tells his truth about
Kreisleriana – but not the whole truth.
Maybe, one day, if I want this work
more down-to-earth, here is an alternative.
To my ears Sérgio
Gallo is more attuned to the requirements
of the Humoreske. It is also a composition
full of contrasts, but it is in a way
more earthbound and I warmed to this
performance. "Humour" in this
context "refers to mood in general"
according to the short programme notes.
It isn’t humorous in the traditional
sense of the word. There is a lot of
what could be termed as ebb-and-flow
in his interpretation of this beautiful
– and powerful – music.
All in all, while not
quite reaching the summit in Kreisleriana,
Sérgio Gallo shows a good understanding
of Schumann’s idiom and the Humoreske
I will certainly return to. It will
definitely be interesting to follow
his development as a Schumann interpreter
when this cycle progresses.
Göran Forsling
Sérgio Gallo (piano) 
