Sergio Fiorentino’s Berlin recordings were made toward
the end of his life, between 1994 and 1997. The performances
that make up the ten discs of this remarkable set - remarkable
for its musical generosity, tonal warmth and freedom from dogmatism
- last eleven hours, give or take, and will surely be welcomed
by admirers of the art of the great Italian pianist, whose death
in 1998 ended the sessions definitively.
Some, perhaps all, have certainly been issued before by APR
in single volumes, but to collect them in this way is to cut
the Gordion knot of discographical confusion. Those who may
have found his earlier recordings rather aloof - he recorded,
for example, on LP for William Barrington-Coupe’s label
under a bizarre menagerie of pseudonyms (Paul Procopolis most
famously) - will not find the same reserve here. They will certainly
not find it in his Schumann, where the G minor Sonata is taken
at supremely well judged tempi, and with dextrous pedalling
and a real elevation of spirit in the slow movement The Fantasie
is perhaps less convincing, but maybe the recording exaggerated
something of a lack of dynamic shaping.
Fiorentino wasn’t necessarily known for his Bach but I
found it spellbinding to listen to him. True, he does what many
have done and fills in bass lines; true, too, his approach to
tempi is inconsistent and sometimes daringly slow; for ‘daringly’
critical listeners will substitute the word ‘terribly’.
Taking a quarter of an hour over the Allemande of the
Fourth Partita is, even I have to admit, something of a liability,
but so thoughtful are the results elsewhere that one must follow
him, even if one doesn’t necessarily sanction the results.
His articulation in Bach is marvellously clear and his tonal
resources are vividly intact.
Fiorentino’s B minor Chopin sonata is a powerfully sculpted
affair, architecturally cogent, but sporting some octave editorialising
that won’t be to all tastes. He is at his most convincing
in the long paragraphs of the sonata, and manages to drive the
music onwards without rushing. Russian repertoire wasn’t
neglected. His Rachmaninoff D minor and B flat minor Sonatas
don’t teem with Slavic intensity but instead retain integrity
by virtue of their demanding approach and structural integrity.
Fiorentino doesn’t stint climactic moments here; he can
thunder with the best of them. He essays three Scriabin sonatas,
repertoire that many will simply not recognise as having been
in his purview, which is to underestimate the breadth of that
repertory, as well as Fiorentino’s questing intelligence.
He plays the First, Second and Fourth sonatas with iron control,
but always with a brain seeking to make structural sense of
the music, whether it darts impressionistically, Chopinesquely
or mystically. This is not Scriabin playing in the galvanic
Russian way - but then which way is the ‘Russian’
way? Sofronitzky, Neuhaus, Feinberg, Richter, Gilels? So, too,
one finds Prokofiev’s Eighth Sonata played with powerful
control, and its grandeur and menace held in fine balance.
There is so much more to enjoy; genial Schubert Impromptus
and rather more grandly incisive performances of the sonatas
in A major D664, A minor D537, and the great and nobly played
B flat major D960. We witness more editorial tinkering in places
during Liszt’s Sonata, but the results are surely more
than deserving of the highest admiration. For a pianist such
as Fiorentino, a mediation between freedom and control is unavoidable
in a work like this. But Fiorentino would always weight his
performance on the side of structural cohesion, sculpting phrases
like a fly fisherman casting sure arcs into the uncertain water.
This is what makes this Liszt sonata performance so impressive.
It’s a performance to return to time and again.
I would say the same too, of his Franck, where he cuts to the
expressive heart of the matter with grandeur and nobility. This
is equally true of Bauer’s arrangement of the Prelude,
fugue and variation Op.18. There is no waste in his performances,
no overpointing or deleterious gestures. A stern critic might,
however, point to those moments where Fiorentino does slightly
distend phrases, a distension that, whilst beautiful in itself,
can be seen to interrupt Franck’s sense of drama. These
performances however remain truly poetic, a governing quality
that Fiorentino found in music to which he was closest.
The booklet notes make for attractive, sometimes wistful reading.
These excellently recorded performances hold an honoured place
in Fiorentino’s recorded legacy, a refining and amplifying
of a legacy dating from the 1950s onwards. There are good reasons
for thinking this the most impressive body of his recordings.
There are good reasons, too, to add this hugely impressive set
to your collection.
Jonathan Woolf
Track listing
CD 1
ROBERT SCHUMANN
FANTASIE in C major Op. 17
Recording: 19 October 1996 (1-3); 18 October 1997 (4,5,10),
14 October 1995 (6-9), 15 October 1995 (11,12) Konzertsaal Siemensvilla,
Berlin
Total time: 73:14
CD 2
FRANZ SCHUBERT
Piano Sonata No. 13 in A major D664
Impromptus Op. 90 D899
Piano Sonata No. 4 in A minor D537
Recording: 20 October 1996 (1-3, 8-10), 18 October 1997 (4-7),
Konzertsaal Siemensvilla, Berlin
Total time: 67:29
CD 3
FRYDERICK CHOPIN
Piano Sonata No. 3 in B minor Op. 58
FRANZ SCHUBERT
Piano Sonata No. 21 in B flat major D960
Recording: 8-9 October 1994, Konzertsaal Siemensvilla, Berlin
Total time: 68:17
CD 4
FRANZ LISZT
Ballade No. 1 in D flat major
Ballade No. 2 in B minor
Funérailles
La leggierezza
Waldesrauschen
Sonata in B minor
Recording: 18-19 October 1997, Konzertsaal Siemensvilla, Berlin
Total time: 76:42
CD 5
CÉSAR FRANCK
Prélude, fugue et variation, Op. 18 (Arr. Bauer)
Prélude, choral et fugue
Prélude, aria et final
Recording: 14 October 1995 (1,2,6-9), 8 October 1995 (3-5)
Konzertsaal Siemensvilla, Berlin
Total time: 67:19
CD 6
ALEXANDER SCRIABIN
Piano Sonata No. 2 in G sharp minor Op. 19 (Sonata-fantasie)
SERGEI RACHMANINOFF
Piano Sonata No. 2 in B flat minor Op. 36 (1931 version)
SERGEI PROKOFIEV
Piano Sonata No 8 in B flat major Op. 84
Recording: 8 October 1994, Konzertsaal Siemensvilla, Berlin
Total time: 63:11
CD 7
ALEXANDER SCRIABIN
Piano Sonata No. 1 in F minor Op. 6
SERGEI RACHMANINOFF
Piano Sonata No. 1 in D minor Op. 28
Recording: 14-15 October 1995, Konzertsaal Siemensvilla, Berlin
Producer: Remus Platen
Engineer: Siegfried Schubert-Weber
Total time: 72:21
CD 8
JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH
Prelude & Fugue in D major BWV532 (Transcriber Busoni, arranged
Fiorentino)
French Suite No. 5 in G major BWV 816
Suite from Partita No. 3 in E major BWV 1006 (Transcribed Rachmaninoff)
Prelude & Fugue in E flat major, BWV552 (St. Anne) (Transcribed
Busoni, arranged Fiorentino)
Recording: October 1996, Konzertsaal Siemensvilla, Berlin
Total time: 65:39
CD 9
JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH
Partita No. 1 in B flat major BWV825
Violin Sonata No. 1 in G minor BWV1001 (transcribed Fiorentino)
Partita No. 4 in D major BWV828
Recording: 19 October 1996, Konzertsaal Siemensvilla, Berlin
Total time: 75:37
CD 10
CLAUDE DEBUSSY
Suite Bergamasque
DOMENICO SCARLATTI
Sonata in E major
Sonata in D minor
MORITZ MOSZKOWSKI
Etude in F major Op 72/6
GABRIEL FAURÉ (Arr. Fiorentino)
Après un rêve
ROBERT SCHUMANN
Carnaval Op.9
FRANZ LISZT
Valse-impromptu
Gnomenreigen
Valse oubliée No.1
Recording: 15 October 1995 (7-9), 19 October 1996 (11), 20 October
1996 (10), 18 October 1997 (1-6, 12-14) Konzertsaal Siemensvilla,
Berlin
Total time: 76:44
Sergio Fiorentino (piano) 