Celebrating Franck & Scriabin
Naum Grubert (piano)
rec. dates not given, Westvest 90, Schiedam, the Netherlands
NAVIS CLASSICS NC22012 [69]
Pianist Naum Grubert follows up previous releases with music of Beethoven and Chopin with a further album from Navis Classics, this time celebrating Franck and Scriabin. There is a certain amount of serendipity in bringing these composers together, with Grubert telling us “when I first thought of recording on the same album Franck’s Prelude, Chorale and Fugue and selected early works by Scriabin, I had no inkling that the two composers were born exactly fifty years apart, and when the album was released in 2022 the world would be celebrating the bicentenary of Franck’s birth and 150th anniversary of Scriabin’s. I simply thought that, despite their largely incompatible creative objectives, their music belonged together. That a mysterious link existed between these two composers on some level, a link that would make them comfortable sharing the same album.”
There is certainly no lack of synergy in both of these composer’s Romantic idiom, though César Franck’s harmonic weight is in the Prélude, Choral, et Fugue is at times more prosaic and abstract when set against the overt poetry of Scriabin’s Preludes Op. 16. Grubert’s pearlescent tone is perfect for both composers, bringing out the melodies in the Franck, giving a lightness of touch to passages with myriads of notes that support them, or creating a perfect balance in the chords of the Choral.
I had a listen to a few comparisons in this piece, starting with the admirable Ivan Moravec on the Supraphon label. There is no questioning Moravec’s musicianship, but his instrument has a slightly ‘period feel’ twang and is less well recorded than Grubert, whose richness of tone and subtlety of touch is well served by Navis Classics. A fairer comparison might be Nikolai Lugansky on Harmonia Mundi (review), though he is more rhetorical in the Prélude and generally a touch swifter in tempo. Grubert is by no means short of drama here, but this is more internalised when set against Lugansky’s heightened sense of peril. Grubert’s sustained feel in the Choral has a funereal heft and is more ‘chorale-like’ than Lugansky, whose greater forward momentum makes those spread chords feel more ornamental. Grubert is again more sustained in tempo in the final Fugue, allowing sonorities to make their impact while by no means dragging and giving plenty of attention to detail in terms of dynamics and articulation. Both players deliver plenty of clarity even where everything seems to be happening at once, but Grubert’s quality of virtuosity manages to communicate a sense of magic and wonder that I can listen to for a long time. My single complaint here is that the work only has one access point on the CD.
Scriabin’s Preludes are all gorgeous pieces, and Naum Grubert has selected his favourites to create “an impression of unity, a cycle of some sort.” This sequence does work very well indeed, and with each piece creating its own atmosphere this part of the programme is like a good novel, a ‘page turner’ that you want to last but can’t wait to hear what comes next. When it comes to Scriabin I always feel on secure ground making comparisons with Maria Lettberg’s excellent set of the complete piano music on Capriccio (review). The Third Sonata counts as “the last and most monumental of his early period”, each of its four movements relating to emotional states of the soul. I’m not usually a big fan of heaving Lisztian emotional piano writing of this kind, but Grubert manages to deliver Scriabin’s expressive arcs in a way that is involving rather than overwhelming. There is an inner life to the playing here that has made me listen anew to this piece, and with a greater appreciation of its character. The Wagnerian swirling that goes on in the final Presto con fuoco is a case in point, but the way Grubert brings out harmonic colour and inner lines is more effective to my ears than with Lettberg, who is more heart-on-sleeve in her approach.
Anything coming after this sonata will always have the feel of an encore, and Grubert’s playing of the Feuillet d’album and two of the best-known Etudes Op. 8 is both delicious and heartily impressive. An important feature of this superbly presented album is Naum Grubert’s own detailed booklet notes, that have extensive, ‘How the Music is Written’ analyses of the biggest works in the programme. These texts are written in a highly informative and approachable way, and will be of great value to anyone interested in these works, beginner or expert.
Dominy Clements
Contents
César Franck (1822-1890)
Prélude, Choral, et Fugue (1884)
Alexander Scriabin (1872-1915)
From: Preludes Op. 16 (1895)
No. 1, B major
No. 2, G-sharp minor
No. 3, G-flat major
No. 4, E-flat major
No. 5, F-sharp major
Op. 9 No. 1, C-sharp minor (for the left hand) (1894)
Op. 15 No. 1, A major (1895)
Op. 15 No. 2, F-sharp minor
Op. 22 No. 2, C-sharp minor (1897)
Op. 22 No. 3, B major
Op. 27 No. 1, G minor (1899)
Op. 13 No. 3, G major (1895)
Sonata No. 3, Op. 23, F-sharp minor (1897-98)
Feuillet d’album, Op. 45 No. 1, E-flat major
Etude Op. 8 No. 11, B-flat minor (1894-95)
Etude Op. 8 No. 12, D-sharp minor (1894-95)
