While
is is undoubtably a Good Thing that EMI are keeping these
classic recordings in the catalogue by reissuing them on
their new GEMINI ‘twofer’ label, keen collectors may
find they already have these very CDs in their collections.
They have appeared in the not too distant past
on EMI’s own Double fforte
budget label, and the recordings were also licensed to Brilliant
Classics, who brought them out in a 4 CD box. In other words,
as if there wasn’t enough competition out there, these new
incarnations have to compete with a market already replete
with copies of the same recordings under different labels.
They have no special remastering attributes or other USPs
- the digital remastering
was already done in 1997 - so EMI must be hoping that another
re-packaging will help things along.
Whatever
their recent history, these late 1970s recordings sound superbly
fresh and vivid. The piano has all of the richness and variety
of colour you would hope for in the four-handed setting,
and Christoph Eschenbach and Justus Frantz always did have
that special chemistry which turns this kind of chamber music-making
into something more than a little special.
Schubert used to host musical evenings at his home to which
musicians would seek to be invited to perform the master’s
works. These were called Schubertiades and the simplest
form of non-solo instrumental music was that for two people
playing one piano - in duet. During his short life, Schubert
probably produced more music for this combination than any
other major composer. The many marches included in this catalogue
of work are covered in volume I of these two sets, but while
many of these have an occasional character they almost invariably
have one or more ‘hooks’ which always make them that little
bit more interesting to perform and listen to than you might
imagine. Not for nothing did many of these works become among
Schubert’s most popular, many of them having been endlessly
arranged for everything from brass band to barrel-organ.
CD 2 of volume I covers the more heavyweight marches, such
as the Grande Marche funêbre and Grande Marche
héroique which were written to mark the death of Tsar
Alexander I and the coronation of Tsar Nicholas I of Russia.
These extended pieces have all the romantic character one
might expect of such themes, even though no-one seems to
know quite why Schubert felt the need to mark these events
in music. The Kindermarsch and two Marches charactéristiques are
all late Schubert, and filled with disarming lyrical simplicity
and racy exuberance respectively. All of these works are
played with consummate control, and the acoustic of Studio
I Abbey Road is undamped, giving the piano wide elbow-room
in which to develop all of the volume of sound and dynamic
one could possibly want.
Volume II of this pair is the one which will interest most
people, containing as it does the great Fantasia D940 and
the Grand Duo D812. Composed between January and April
of his last year of life, 1828, the Fantasia in F minor recalls
the happy days that Schubert spent with Countess Caroline
Esterházy, to whom it is dedicated. It is thought that his
one-time pupil was the object of a great deal of Schubert’s
affection in that he once claimed that, in his own mind,
all of his works were dedicated to her. Eschenbach and Frantz set out at a fair pace in the opening
of the Fantasia, but everything they do has elegance
and subtlety. The tempo suits the dramatic second theme,
which becomes a driving, elemental force. I like this duo’s
well considered dynamic layering of themes and accompaniments,
and only find their touch a little heavy-handed in the first
fugal entries in the coda (track 7, 7:02). They don’t knock
my desert island favourite of Murray Perahia and Radu Lupu
(Sony, originally CBS) off its perch, and I still have the
recent grandly impressive two-piano version of Evgeny Kissin
and James Levine (RCA) rattling around in my brain, but we’re
entering a different price class with this one.
The Allegro D947 is very impressive on this recording – Eschenbach
and Frantz’s dramatic style suiting the extremes of contrast
in this piece to excellent effect. They pace themselves well
over the vast expanse of the Grand Duo in C D812,
pointing out the intimately pianistic nature of the work
as well as its symphonic scale of design.
Despite the generation gap between these and the more recent
recordings currently available, Eschenbach and Frantz give
no quarter in terms of performance or recorded sound. I would
certainly recommend these two volumes over the Naxos series,
and, having toyed with the Yaara Tal and Andreas Groethuysen
complete recordings on Sony, have my doubts as to whether
the difference in price represents an equally significant
benefit in terms of quality. Just look at those timings as
well – certainly no doubts about value there. In other words,
all you have to do before hastening to add these CDs to your
collections is make sure you don’t have them already – though
if you do, I can’t imagine you would have forgotten.
Dominy
Clements
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Christoph Eschenbach and Justus
Frantz (piano) 
