Chants Populaires
Leonid DESYATNIKOV (b.1955)
Songs of Bukovina (2017) [43:26]
Béla BARTÓK (1881-1945)
15 Hungarian Peasant Songs Sz.71 (1914-1918) [13:19]
Pyotr Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)
Dumka Op.59 (1886) [8:33]
Lukas Geniušas (piano)
rec. 19-21 September 2019, Gustav Mahler Concert Hall, Toblach/Dobbiaco,
Italy
Reviewed as a digital download from a press preview
MIRARE MIR440
[65:18]
I first became aware of the Russian-Lithuanian pianist Lukas Geniušas
through his 2018 release of Prokofiev piano sonatas and other solo works
(MIR412).
Here, I thought, was a musician brimming with imaginative ideas about the
music and the fingers to deliver those ideas. Whilst his follow-up disc of
Chopin took him into a much more competitive part of the repertoire, I
found the same capacity to find new ways of performing much-played music as on
the Prokofiev disc. I was left in the curious position of simultaneously
accepting that Geniušas couldn’t really compete with the very best in, say,
the Chopin third sonata and yet listening to and enjoying his performances
a lot. It is partly a matter of the sound he makes, which is remarkably
wide in range. Partly, it is his sparky and sparkling intelligence which
brings a real sense of play to the music.
For this release, the substantial part of the programme departs from the
mainstream for something much rarer. If I had some lingering doubts about
his Chopin, I have none about his playing of these folk song-inspired
pieces by the Russian composer, Leonid Desyatnikov. As with the Prokofiev
on his earlier disc, this is music that fits Geniušas like a glove. The
music is wry, fantastical and full of opportunities for a pianist with the
range of colour Geniušas has under his fingertips.
The songs in question hail from Bukovina, an area of Eastern Europe that
straddles Romania and Ukraine. Desyatnikov was born in Kharkov in Ukraine
and though Wikipedia lists him as a Russian composer, he clearly cherishes
his links to the area if this music is anything to go by.
I doubt that many listeners hearing this music without knowing its
background would guess that it dated from 2017. If I said that it seems a
continuation of Bartók’s folk song arrangements, I do not mean the abrasive
Bartók of the Allegro Barbaro or the Third String Quartet. Unlike so many
contemporary composers who attempt to turn back the musical clock to more
traditional days, Desyatnikov is neither bland nor derivative.
The piece takes inspiration from a 1957 collection of traditional songs
from the area but the creative relationship to them is more tangential than
straight arrangements. The helpful sleeve notes point out that, like
Debussy with his preludes, in the score the song titles are placed at the
end of each piece. So the songs are much more of a jumping-off point. They
certainly seem to have fired Desyatnikov’s fertile imagination.
There are 24 pieces in total, following the tonal scheme made most famous
by Bach’s Well Tempered Clavier though there is nothing Bach-like about
them. They are highly diverse in style, so that the effect is more like a
folky version of Chopin Preludes. Desyatnikov clearly does not see the piano as a
percussion instrument, nor are any pianos plucked or sawed during these
compositions! I can imagine these pieces being extremely popular if given
the right exposure.
With Geniušas it isn’t just a matter of tone colour. He has a capacity to
turn a phrase so that a whole cast of characters comes to life before our
eyes. He is like a master storyteller. One minute he speaks in the voice of
young lovers frustrated that the night is too brief (Oh Petrivocha! A Night
So Short), the next he speaks as a child thrilling to the bright sun (The
Wind is Blowing, The Sun is Warm) or with playful coquetry (I’ll go into
the Garden). Not that he is lacking in gravitas in the more serious pieces
such as A Rocky Mountain. This is music that, like folk music, gets to the
heart of the matter with great economy of means. Poplars Grew from one
Field to Another is full of soulful melancholy devoid of sentiment that in
Geniušas’ hands communicates a powerful sense of loss, regret and
displacement.
As this suggests, there is no hint of monotony in the teeming diversity of
this composition. Geniušas matches this with playing whose creativity is
never about making a splash but to illustrate or enhance the effect of the
music. He is particularly good at giving a distinctive sound to each strand
of the musical texture, as in the almost Debussy-like Red Arrowwood, Green
Leaves. He can also float a melody as seamlessly and effortlessly as the
best of them as in the gentle Pike in the Sea. It is worth pointing out
that, even though this was written in 2017, it is full of great tunes –
Bukovina is clearly blessed musically for all its complex history, or
perhaps because of it! It has been recorded before by Alexei Goribol on
Melodiya but this new version eclipses it completely in terms of
performance and the quality of the recording, which is excellent.
Desyatnikov clearly takes these melodies and uses them as the basis for
little musical folk tales. They Say I’ve Lost My Looks is given a crabby,
angular setting, which has just the right note of bitterness to bring up an
image of a narrator looking envious at younger men and women. The
marvellously named A Woman Had a Husband, She Loved Peter Though is given a
rumbunctious rolling rhythm that suggests that the plot of this particular
song involves all kinds of shenanigans. Geniušas positively romps through
all of these and pulls out all the stops in the virtuosic, ironic You
Singer. The final song is a piece of the utmost delicacy and affecting
loveliness and Geniušas, like all the best musicians, is virtually able to
make time stand still even though it lasts less than two minutes. When I
first listened to this disc, instead of proceeding to the much more
celebrated Bartók, I went back to track one and listened to these playful,
crafty, illuminating, touching compositions all over again. The combination
of Desyatnikov and Geniušas will have this recording staying with me for
the rest of the year at least.
But what of the Bartók? To begin with Geniušas happily does not make the
mistake of thinking that because these pieces are simple they lack anything
musically. Bartók’s immersion in this music enables him to select again and
again just the right little touch to complement the melody. Those touches
always have the unique character of the melody in my mind. Indeed, it is
this sensitivity to what the songs are about that unites Bartók and
Desyatnikov. Bartók insisted on the words of the songs being published in
the score so that the performer would not just think of them as tunes. He
wants performer and listener to immerse themselves in the whole world and
culture from which these songs emerge. Geniušas’ instincts are finely
calibrated to pick up every nuance of these settings. Sometimes he
surprises by slightly underplaying some of the more vigorous dances only to
reveal a deeper, stranger and more evocative sound picture that Bartók has
conjured up as a context for the melody. He is tuned into the atmosphere of
each piece, which makes them as much about place as melody. In the final
song I see a scene of an ancient culture summoned up before my eyes.
With Tchaikovsky’s Dumka, we are in a more conventional world of art music.
I hadn’t previously heard this particular piece before and Geniušas makes
an excellent case for me, though I had missed out. Needless to say, he is in
harmony with the heartfelt folk-like elements of the music but I imagine it
was chosen to close the programme with an opportunity for Geniušas to show
off a few more of his virtuosic musical muscles after the subtle details of
the Desyatnikov and Bartók. It sits within the programme rather as an
encore might in a concert programme and I enjoyed it a lot.
Desyatnikov’s composition deserves wide recognition on its own merits
regardless of Geniušas’ inspired interpretation. Likewise, I hope that a
pianist of Geniušas’ quality is not overlooked because of taking risks on
unproven material. I had a very high opinion of him before listening to
this recording and it is now even higher. A pianist playing music as
enjoyable as this in a manner as persuasive as this makes this a CD I have
already listened to many times and no doubt will many times to come.
David McDade
