In the liner-notes for this release Pentatone describe the Armenian
pianist Nareh Arghamanyan as ‘one of the most promising talents
of her generation’. She has already recorded two albums for
this label, solo pieces by Rachmaninov (PTC5186399) and the Liszt
concertos. This time around she tackles Khachaturian’s rarely
heard Piano Concerto and Prokofiev’s ubiquitous Third. The catalogue
is bulging with recommendable versions of the latter, so it’s
the former that’s likely to be of most interest to collectors.
Khachaturian’s concerto was the first of his works to do well
outside the Soviet Union; some consider the RCA recording, with William
Kapell and the Boston Symphony under Serge Koussevitzky, to be indispensable;
made less than a decade after the concerto’s Moscow premiere
in 1937 it’s now available on a Naxos Historical disc that Chris
Howell reviewed
in 2002. Alicia de Larrocha’s Decca recording is also highly
regarded, but I'm particularly attached to Constantine Orbelian’s
version, with Neeme Järvi and the Scottish National Orchestra in dangerously
good form (Chandos). That said, anyone interested in this piece should
hear the late Peter Katin's Everest recording with Hugo Rignold and
the LSO. I have a very decent 24-bit rip from the DVD-A, but I suspect
the latest Countdown re-master, available from HDtracks, will sound
even better.
How does Arghamanyan fare in this concerto? She does a fair job in
the first movement, although the accompaniment is somewhat cautious
in character. The recording is good on detail – especially in
those pellucid solo passages – but it’s rather soft-edged,
and that’s not ideal in the orchestral outbursts. Also, the
piano seems to lack body, and the soundstage is far too narrow for
my taste. More worryingly the performance drifts into the doldrums
- and stays there. I do sympathise with attempts to tone down the
concerto’s gaudier elements - if, indeed, that's the intention
here - but I'm not convinced the piece responds to such amelioration.
After that becalmed first movement the Andante con anima
fares little better. Orbelian and Järvi make far more of the music’s
underlying, almost mesmeric tread; their performance - like Katin
and Rignold's - is bold and vivid where the newcomers’ is grey
and rather hesitant. No, this is the kind of repertoire that needs
- nay, demands - to be played for all it’s worth. It's
that edge-of-the-seat approach - slightly less evident in the Orbelian/Järvi
account than the wildly virtuosic Katin/Rignold one - that makes these
two versions so covetable. In such company Arghamanyan and Altinoglu
simply don't stand a chance, as their less than brillante
finale confirms.
After that I must confess to a sense of foreboding as I approached
the Prokofiev. That, too, is a work that welcomes a robust approach;
listen to any of the more charismatic/dynamic pianists who have recorded
the work and that becomes crystal clear. Next to them Arghamanyan
and Altinoglu seem cruelly constrained. One need only compare their
flaccid account of the theme and variations with, say, Michel Béroff
and Kurt Masur’s living, breathing, fiercely articulated one
to realise just how much is missing here. On Chandos Jean-Efflam Bavouzet
and the BBC Phil under Gianandrea Noseda achieve a good balance between
ebullience and inwardness. More important, the range of colour they
find in this score is astonishing. Alas, those hoping for a late rally
from the Pentatone partnership will be sorely disappointed.
Outclassed by the competition; look elsewhere.
Dan Morgan
twitter.com/mahlerei
