Under the rubric of ‘The Great Pianist Composers’
Angela Brownridge and Cameo Classics present three recently
recorded discs devoted to a selection of works by Schumann,
Chopin and Liszt. The attempt is presumably to give a cross-section
of works by each composer with each disc circling around a major
Sonata.
Brownridge is certainly no stranger to the music of Schumann.
In fact she recorded the Album for the Young for Hyperion,
and it can now be found on Helios CDH55039. Here she performs
the G minor Sonata with great attention to detail, taking excellent
tempi, and playing with skill and sensitivity. Judged by the
highest exemplars on disc - let’s say Levitzki, Grainger
and Gilels to choose three - she can be heard to hang fire,
lacking the sense of drive and anticipation generated by that
trio of titans. Her reserve is certainly not unattractive but
she is not one ardently to phrase through paragraphs. Her tone
though is warm and often delightful. In Carnaval she
seems especially preoccupied with the music’s dance elements,
and takes her time exploring and presenting them, as she does
in Pierrot. Textures are light and there is real clarity
in her performances. Chopin is not effusive and she abjures
the grand seignorial in Paganini. This disc is completed
by attractive performances of the Abegg Variations, and
a genial-sounding Arabesque.
Volume two is devoted to Chopin. She plays the four Scherzos,
the Fantasie in F minor and the B minor Sonata. If one starts
with the sonata, one reprises those virtues of tonal lustre,
refinement of phrasing and distinctive clarity that illuminated
her Schumann disc. The only limitations, really, are expressive
ones. Both here and in, say, the Fantasie one feels her holding
back at the ends of phrases where she could, with profit, drive
onwards. There is sometimes a shying away from emotional commitment.
This is a shame as her bright and engaging Scherzos, especially
No.4, show that ‘she could if she would’.
Her Liszt sonata doesn’t feel especially fast but when
one looks at one’s watch one realises that it is. It must
be one of the fastest performances on disc in fact. Again, the
salient points to note are those of digital clarity and a studied
refusal to over-pedal. Indeed she is scrupulous throughout these
three discs in her avoidance of over-pedalling. Her approach
is thus strongly linear, avoiding muddied textures. Her chording
is sound, and highly accomplished. Occasionally this does come
across as rather circumspect and almost surgical. The physical
demands of this sonata are strong and I felt energy somewhat
sapping toward the end, which loses phrasal shape once or twice,
good though the earlier fugal section is. Clearly Horowitz,
Argerich, Arrau and Fiorentino, to name a formidable quartet,
offer a wholly different, more knotty, kinetic, virtuosic and
overwhelming experience. In addition, her Petrarch Sonnets are
again marked by directness - though her No.47 is surely too
detached and cool. However her Il Penseroso is another
matter; it has something of the gaunt trajectory of Sofronitzky’s
recording. And Canzonetta del Salvator Rosa has a straightforward
and engaging quality, though it doesn’t seek to replicate
Sofronitzky’s occasional outbursts of raw emotion.
There are two different venues involved in these three discs.
The recording quality is excellent though, being cut at a relatively
low level, you’ll need to turn up the volume. In all these
are sympathetic performances.
Jonathan Woolf
Masterwork Index: Liszt
piano sonata
Angela Brownridge (piano) 
