Edvard GRIEG (1843-1907)
Piano Concerto in A minor op.16 [29:27]
Franz LISZT (1911-1886)
Piano Concerto No.1 in E flat major S124 [19:19]
Fantasy on Hungarian Folk Themes S123 [15:30]
Jean-Baptiste LULLY (1632-1687)
Gavotte en rondeau in D minor [2:21]
Domenico SCARLATTI (1685-1757)
Sonata in D major K96 ‘La Chasse’ [2:30]
Georges Cziffra (piano)
Orchestre National de l’ORTF/Georges Tzipine (Grieg), Andre Cluytens
(Liszt)
rec. Paris, France, 17 April 1959 (Grieg), Paris, France, 12 March,1959 (Liszt),
Luxembourg, 20 January 1959 (Lully, Scarlatti). Mono. ADD.
ICA CLASSICS ICAC5079 [69:42]
They say that what goes around comes around. That’s how I feel about
the Grieg piano concerto when played by Cziffra. It was one of the very first
LPs I ever bought for myself at age 18 with its distinctive cover of beautifully
photographed autumn leaves and a recording with the Philharmonia Orchestra
under André Vandernoot (HMV ALP 1678). I cherished the record with
its coupling of Liszt’s piano concerto no.2 until one day very foolishly
I had my portable record player sitting on my bed (why!?) and then absentmindedly
threw a hot water bottle onto it making the stylus jump and skitter across
the disc completely ruining it. I never found another copy until 53 years
later, earlier this year in fact, when I found the self-same LP in my local
Oxfam charity shop paying three times what I bought it for in 1959 and was
bowled over by my luck.
Now I have the good fortune to be able to review another recording of Cziffra
playing the Grieg recorded live in 1959 with the Orchestre National de l’ORTF
under Georges Tzipine, along with Liszt’s 1st piano concerto
under Cluytens. Above all it confirms my impression forged all those years
ago of Cziffra as a mighty powerhouse of a pianist whose expressive playing
did the greatest service to a composer any artist can give. Reading the notes
however, I find that amongst the controversy that Cziffra always engendered
is the suggestion that Cziffra could be said to have stood Ashkenazy’s
dictum (‘I like to think that we are now more music’s servants
than her masters’) on its head. That surely cannot be said of his recordings
of Liszt, however; Marcel Dupré called Cziffra a reincarnation of Liszt.
How can any pianist overdo the playing of Liszt when Liszt could equally well
have been described as Cziffra was by London critics as combining ‘the
precision of a metronome with the electrical discharge of a thunderstorm’?
Acclaimed in the west after his dramatic escape from Hungary in 1956 as ‘greater
than Horowitz’ Cziffra took the world by storm with performances that
were breathtaking in their sheer power to impress. Audiences were, as the
notes so eloquently put it, taken ‘by the throat and sent ... reeling
into the night mesmerised by his aplomb’. As the notes further point
out Cziffra was such a contrast in an age when pianists were often indistinguishable
from one another. So here was a pianist whose performances invited controversy
and divided his listeners into two camps, lovers and haters.
The first thing that struck me about this CD was the clarity of sound considering
the age of the recording. It’s hats off to Peter Reynolds for a brilliant
job of re-mastering the tapes for their first ever release on CD. As I believe
is often the case with those performances one hears for the first time, Cziffra’s
interpretation of the Grieg became my aural benchmark against which, knowingly
or not, all others have been judged down the years. In such cases, and with
me there are several, I find myself saying to myself when listening to other
recordings of this or that work “too fast” or “too slow”.
This means that as far as I’m concerned I’ve never heard anyone
play the Grieg piano concerto better. In Cziffra’s electrifying performance
every single note is telling making for the most complete account I can ever
imagine hearing. Reading this you might think that Cziffra found it more difficult
to be tender when required, only really being able to portray the tumultuous
sounds, but that thought is dispelled as soon as the second movement gets
under way. Following a brilliant opening movement in which the main theme
is fairly hammered to the musical mast, the Adagio is caressed and
set as a wonderfully crafted contrast to the two outer movements. The final
movement is eventually seized and driven on to its scintillating conclusion,
though not before the first half of it is quietly restrained with the notes
gently coaxed into being, setting up the last five minutes to be driven almost
manically along to a conclusion that releases the audience’s eruption
of applause. The performance may well divide listeners but it is certainly
not one you are likely to feel ambivalent about. That will surely be the case
with anything Cziffra touched. His Liszt is renowned for its fantastic shows
of pianistic energy. However, the first movement of Liszt’s 1st
concerto is as gently portrayed as anyone could want. The opening of the second
movement is also beautifully light and dreamy though the darker levels are
hinted at along the way leading from Quasi adagio into Allegretto
vivace - Allegro animato and the kind of playing that elicited the statement
from Dupré that Cziffra was Liszt’s reincarnation. The concerto
is brought to a characteristically brilliant conclusion that leaves one breathless
in awe and admiration. This is again underlined by the storm of applause from
the audience. I watched a short video of Cziffra playing Liszt’s Grand
gallop chromatique. There the full extent of his amazing abilities are
plain to see as his hands each appear to have more than five fingers as they
rush across the keys. His fingers seem to have been extremely long.
The two concertos are followed by another great demonstration of Lisztian
showmanship: the Fantasy on Hungarian Folk Themes S123. It is often
said that this or that soloist has a particular music in their blood; that
cannot be truer than in this case since Cziffra’s heritage was from
the Roma community. His father was a player of that most emblematic instrument
of the Hungarian gypsy, the cimbalom. His account of this rich and exciting
work is extremely authentic as you would expect with Cziffra’s fingers
dancing up and down the keyboard as the piano mimics the cimbalom most convincingly.
You can hear this particularly around 13 minutes in as the piece rushes towards
its stunning climax which gives way once more to the audience’s enthusiastic
reaction.
Apparently Cziffra loved the miniatures that he reserved for his encores.
The disc concludes with two delightful pieces, a beautifully restrained account
of Lully’s Gavotte en rondeau in D minor and Scarlatti’s
Sonata in D major K96 ‘La Chasse’. These leave you wanting
more which is the perfect way for any artist to finish a concert.
As I stated at the beginning Cziffra divides opinion between his admirers
of which I am one and those who feel his playing was mannered and far too
idiosyncratic. There are unlikely to be many who cannot make up their minds
either way. In a century the first half of which saw many unique pianists
the like of whom we shall surely not see again, certainly in such numbers,
Cziffra is right up there with the greatest. He was the man who was characterised
by one American critic as ‘a caveman with earrings’ and will remain
a controversial figure whose recorded legacy is a treasure trove for those
who have yet to discover him. I cannot praise this disc too highly and if
you do not know Cziffra you are indeed lucky to have this chance to hear him
at the very peak of his powers.
Steve Arloff
I’ve never heard anyone play the Grieg piano concerto better. Cziffra
at the very peak of his powers.
Masterwork Index: Grieg piano concerto