This release has been reviewed by Rob Barnett (see
review) and I am very glad to be able to concur with
his positive responses. I have always been a big admirer of Schnittke, and
the piano sonatas reinforce some of the reasons for this. In a masterpiece
such as the
Piano Sonata No. 1, striking defiance, pain and
profundity meet with the beauty of sound a fine pianist such as Simon Smith
can conjure from his instrument. The half-hour duration of this work is
something truly symphonic and intensely satisfying - a journey which early
on takes us into desolate and even disarming simplicity, with touches which
almost overlap into Erik Satie territory, but derived from an entirely
different source. The third movement's glacial
Lento is all
remoteness and alienation from expectation, while the final
Allegro
is stunningly technical but a strikingly dramatic 'wow'.
Neither of the other two sonatas can top the first one, but each has its
own fine qualities. The
Sonata No. 2 has a more lyrical, almost
romantic atmosphere at times, though Schnittke's restless nature never
allows him to settle on anything for long. Darkly sepulchral passages
suggest an underlying chorale in the second movement, though the stained
glass is distorted and easily splintered. Violence is not escaped in the
final
Allegro moderato, though the thrills sometimes also have a
cinematic 'chase' quality. Extreme contrast and a centre of disturbed beauty
is also present in this finale, with music dragged with reluctance from the
angels crowding Schnittke's mind.
The
Piano Sonata No. 3 inhabits the spare sound of Schnittke's
later works. This enigmatic musical environment can be harder to assimilate,
but the composer's signature can be found everywhere, and if you can accept
the whole in the same way as you might the late piano pieces of Liszt or the
strange details in Goya's 'Black Paintings' - image divorced from its
grandness of theme - then you can find yourself wandering in wonder inside a
world hard to explain but easier to appreciate on its own terms.
CD 1 ends with the
Variations, written while Schnittke was still
a student in Moscow. Here, the 'signature' has yet to emerge, and the
influences of Rachmaninov and other great musical ancestors are ever present
both in pianist technique and compositional invention.
You might be lulled into thinking that CD 2 is filled with less
consequential pieces, but the
Prelude and Fugue is a mighty work
built around serial atonality, filled with dark foreboding at the start and
sparkling with remarkable, fascinating and witty developments in the fugal
second section.
Improvisations and Fugue is another exploration of
serial techniques, both of these works showing Schnittke sailing directly
against the favoured musical styles of Soviet social realism. This opens
with a similar edgy rhythm and spikiness of accent found in the beginning of
the previous
Fugue, this second
Fugue tricky to recognise
as such, given its intensity and abstract but unmistakably dramatic feel.
Written as a competition test piece the
Improvisation and Fugue
demands considerable virtuosity, and Simon Smith is well up to the task.
Variations on a Chord is a kind of hybrid, using serial
techniques but delivering variety on identical notes - those of the 'chord'
- only through rhythm, dynamics, accents, and the suggestion of melodic
shape. The results are startling and intriguing: a kind of musical
mathematics exercise which takes Webern all the way from Weimar to Moscow.
The
Little Piano Pieces are relatively simple pieces for young
players, but as ever with such works, difficulties and surprises lurk all
over the place, keeping us all on our toes. The superb
Homage to Igor
Stravinsky, Sergei Prokofiev and Dmitri Shostakovich is in a category
of its own, being for three players at one piano. Extremes of range and the
ability to play lots of notes at once arise sparingly, the layering of each
part often having plenty of clarity. You can have fun identifying the
references, but they are also helpfully outlined in the booklet. The
Five Aphorisms are also not insubstantial, intensifying some of the
atmosphere of the sonatas through compression. The
Sonatina for
piano duet is a later piece in 'antique' style, though as ever with
Schnittke the classical sonorities are merely a springboard for strange
imaginings. This leads into a sequence of
Cadenzas which sound
stranger out of context than they would in a full performance. These are
intriguing journeys into the themes of Mozart, though Simon Smith does less
to make them sound Mozartean than perhaps one might have hoped.
There are some serious competitors in this field, but not many who offer
quite the comprehensiveness of this Delphian two disc set. Boris Berman's
Chandos recordings on two separate discs are amongst the leaders, but while
his playing is superb I don't hear it as delivering quite the same clarity
of structure and direction I've enjoyed from Smith. Berman introduces an
extra layer of poetry into his interpretations which has its appeal, but
gives the impression of keeping us hanging around for longer as a result,
though a peek at timings in fact gives the lie to this. One thing is clear,
Simon Smith can easily challenge at the highest level and to my ears gives
us a sharpness of focus on these pieces which makes him a real winner.
Dominy Clements
Previous review:
Rob
Barnett
