Rightly included in
the recent Philips Great Pianists
of the 20th Century series
Grigory Ginzburg was a near contemporary
of Sofronitsky, Horowitz and Barere
to name three Russian pianists with
whose musicianship his own bears some
comparison. His name has attracted less
international lustre than theirs, mainly
because he died at fifty-seven and spent
most of his career in the Soviet Union
and also because his recordings have
been at the mercy of the Melodiya catalogues.
Collectors will know how notoriously
unreliable they proved – certainly in
the LP era. Those fortunate enough to
have amassed a sizeable chunk of his
discography – I’m not amongst that number
– will have become aware of the astonishing
brilliance and poetry embodied in his
playing; not just in respect of digital
accuracy but in romantic finesse and
beauty and depth of tone.
One of Alexander Goldenweiser’s
most famous pupils, Ginzburg studied
at the Moscow Conservatoire and won
the first International Chopin Competition
in 1927 at the age of twenty-four. For
many years he combined an active concert
career with extensive teaching at his
old college and despite a heart attack
in 1959 and the discovery of inoperable
cancer he continued giving concerts
almost to the end, in December 1961.
These three CDs form
part of a larger six CD collection of
live recordings culled from the Ginzburg
family’s archive. They are all live
performances, given in Moscow during
the years 1949 to 1957. The sound quality
varies, as one would expect, though
it’s never less than serviceable and
frequently considerably better. In view
however of the relative paucity of such
material we should be grateful for the
riches that are here, ones that embrace
such well known Ginzburg turns as the
Réminiscences de Don Juan and
Prokofiev’s Third Sonata, as well as
examples of his Scriabin, an album devoted
entirely to Bach, hyphenated or otherwise,
the two Liszt Concertos and a sumptuous
example of his limpid poeticism in the
shape of the Schubert.
His Liszt is captured
in rather raw 1949 sound. But right
away we can appreciate the portentous
call to arms announced by conductor
Nikolai Anosov and the soloist’s balletic
grace; there’s something distinctly
aerial in Ginzburg’s passagework in
the E flat major as well as sufficient
fantasy and drama in the finale. His
articulation is at its most bejewelled
in the central passages of the A major;
Anosov helps with some delicious string
moulding in the Marziale section and
there’s a sense of mutual understanding
between the two throughout. We can also
hear a genuinely poetically uplifting
Rhapsodie espagnole and his famous reading
of Ständchen in the Liszt transcription,
truly special. To tie up the first disc
we have Ginzburg’s own rip-roaring Fantasia
on a theme of Largo al factotum from
Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia, four
minutes of Golden Age pianism that will
have you enthralled.
His Bach disc derives
from a later 1957 recital at the Grand
Hall of the Moscow Conservatoire. It’s
a shame that the Christmas Day audience
was suffering doubtless understandable
bronchial attacks because the coughs
riddle his Siciliano (from the Flute
Sonata) but we can hear the great delicacy
of his playing as we can the powerful
attack of his Toccata and Fugue. The
Busoni transcribed Ich ruf’ zu hir,
Herr Jesu Christ is delicately phrased
and relatively slow and has depth of
bass leading notes that give it richness
and significance; it’s not at all dramatic
in the Petri manner, rather it’s reflective
and introspective. The Chaconne begins
with a rather cautious and expressive
carapace; strong rubati abound and though
passionate in places (where he fumbles
and rushes bars in his haste) I was
left with an impression of iconoclasm
in this performance; it’s not entirely
convincing, a feeling that extends to
his Bach in general.
The third disc captures
the second part of the Bach recital
noted above. The Prokofiev sonata is
on the Philips disc, though it’s a different
performance – none of the performances
on these three discs have apparently
been reissued before. This live performance
has the requisite heroic intensity and
clarity. The Scriabin Etudes are somewhat
more problematic. His contemporary Sofronitsky
sculpts the B flat minor Etude with
more drama in his 1960 Moscow recital
– though Ginzburg’s is a reading strong
on poetics. Ginzburg concentrates on
colour and depth of tone whereas another
contemporary, Horowitz, takes a stance
mid way between the two, employing a
deal of metrical flexibility. Ginzburg’s
D sharp minor is subject to some mildly
chaotic passagework amidst the torrent.
It’s very fast indeed and – maybe this
is the recording’s fault – at an unrelieved
forte throughout. Certainly it lacks
entirely the other two pianists’ qualities
of phrasing. In Chopin – one example
so we can hardly draw conclusive judgements
- he is sweet and warm but less laudably
he cuts the Mazurka. I have to say it
doesn’t sound like a Mazurka
rhythmically; for all Horowitz’s naughtiness
his recording always does. The famous
Ginzburg Réminiscences de Don
Juan S418 are here; not quite the equal
of Barere but then who ever has been.
And we also have some unusual repertoire
in the shape of the Gershwin Preludes.
He plays these with an affectionate
rather late nineteenth century feeling.
They become studies in Russian melancholia
(the C sharp minor) rather than New
World pep; you won’t find much evidence
of the deciso indication in the
E flat minor either. If you can get
the opposite of Jack Gibbons in Gershwin
this is it.
Released to celebrate
the hundredth anniversary of his birth,
which fell in 2004, these discs constitute
a valuable slice of rare, live Ginzburg.
The notes are uniform for each CD and
deal with the biography. His was a monumental
talent, cut lamentably short, and we
hear strong evidence of it here. Of
course it’s an uneven set and there
are some aural distractions but given
those caveats nevertheless recommended
to admirers and newcomers alike.
Jonathan Woolf
