Olga Vinokur was born in Russia and began her piano studies at
six, before emigrating to Israel where she studied in Tel-Aviv.
She is now a Doctoral candidate at the Manhattan School of Music
in New York. She's been active giving concerts across America
and has made broadcasts. This CD, self-produced, can be obtained,
as can further information about her, from her website or by contacting
her direct at the email address noted in this review.
Her recital lays out
her reportorial wares - virtuoso Liszt and her native Russian
Prokofiev, Scriabin and Rachmaninoff. The recordings were made
in May and November 2005 though no location is noted. There's
an ambient noise audible and pedalling is caught with quite
an amount of 'noisy' air but I daresay these relative limitations
are not as important as the nature of the playing and the intimations
of future promise they may hold.
Vinokur is certainly
a musician of taste, though as yet she can be a little cautious
when measured against those long established masters in the
field. That's the case with her Transcendental Etude where
such titans of the repertoire such as Sergio Fiorentino and
Joyce Hatto demonstrate how much can be ventured without
blurring or loss. In the Kreisler-Rachmaninoff Liebeslied we find plenty
of the latter composer but not much sign of the former. Rachmaninoff's
own recording embeds capricious Kreisleresque rubati and rallentandi
to giddy effect.
The selections from
the Opp.33 and 39 Etudes-Tableaux are played with consistent
intelligence. Op.39 No.2 in A minor is rather withdrawn and
Vinokur doesn't shape voicings in a way more mature
performances would succeed in doing. Op.39 No.6 is similarly rather careful,
with melody lines failing to sing out at speed, as they very
definitely do in Joyce Hatto's traversal on Concert Artist.
Her Scriabin cleaves
more to the aristocratic model established by such as Neuhaus
than to the more visceral trajectory of a Sofronitsky. So whilst
she doesn't explore the intense conversational melancholy and
passion of Op.9 No.1 with anything that approximates Sofronitsky's
drama she does hover closer to Neuhaus's ethos in Op.11 No.5.
Here her patrician take is more aligned with his own, though
without his warmth of tone. In time she will bring more athleticism
and colour to bear on Op.11 No.20 and in the case of Op.11 No.2
ensure that phrase endings do not taper off. Her Prokofiev Sarcasms
however are sharply etched and have requisite personality.
Doubtless we shall
be hearing more of Vinokur in the years ahead. This serves nicely
as a calling card of her accomplishments so far and her strengths
in the Russian repertoire in particular.
Jonathan Woolf