Chopin's mazurkas

[Mandryka]

The Argerich op 59s I like the most are live (I think) in 1965, this one:



I don't know if it's the same. I don't think so. I'll check when I'm at home.

The Pogorelich is IMO superior to the Argerich, but many wouldn't agree. It's here, but this may be very hard to find. If people want it I can upload it easily enough

[The Raven]

is a different recording than the one on the cd you posted.  Is that correct?

Those were recorded in 1967 at Akademie der Wissenschaft in Munich

and those in 1965 at EMI Abbey Road Studios in London.

Finally, those are previously unreleased german radio recordings in 1967 at WDR in Cologne.

The dates are only for Op. 59/1-3

[Bogey]

Very helpful.  Thanks for the footwork, gents.

[Mandryka]

There's a very good transfer of Jonas's Mazurkas here -- much better than the transfer on Pearl.

http://randomclassics.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=maryla

[Brian]

New this month on Avie Records:



A new recording of Russell Sherman playing the mazurkas!

[Todd]

New this month on Avie Records:



A new recording of Russell Sherman playing the mazurkas!

Hot damn!  Added to my cart.  How will his octogenarian fingers fare?

[Mandryka]

Actually, I like the Pearl more. More noise, but more high frequency info. The download to me sounds muffled.

Are they the same performances?

[pbarach]

I had the Jonas mazurkas on 78s. The Pearl transfers have rumble and hiss, and they sound like the 78s.

[Mandryka]

I listened to some of the OP 68/2s I've managed to accumulate.

I could see a sort of family resemblance, or maybe just points of influence,  between what  Sherman makes of it  and Wasowski's record. And maybe Ignaz  Friedmnan too.

The most moving examples I could find were from the usual suspects -- Sofronitsky in 1946 on Denon, Rubinstein's mono, Michelangeli on Brown Aura and Sokolov. The Michelangeli was particularly attractive I thought -- a good combination of foot and head, peasant dance and spiritual elevation.

[Mandryka]

It's in the Brown Aura box -- it's just too much of a fag to find the CD for the dates. It's all ripped and the box itself is in the attic, somewhere . . .

[Mandryka]

Some recent mazurka discoveries, responses collected here really so I don't lose them.



Perlemuter, more than anyone else I've heard, including Rosen, makes the music sound contrapuntally and harmonically adventurous and experimental. The disonance he produces, in the central sections, presumably by staggering the voices slighly and using the pedal, is totally unexpected.



Block makes the music sound ambiguous. On the one hand it's political, music which is teaming with patriotic anthems and calls to the fight. On the other it if full of all sorts of ineffable, autumnal feelings, wistfulness. 

Block is from the beautiful tone school of piano playing - burnished, legato, impeccable execution, flowing, rounded, colourful. Despite this, the ambiguity makes these great poetry, as William Empson would have said, and I think this is a magnificent recording.



Frenczy's touch and timbre is like nothing I can remember hearing, the style is dainty almost, delicate certainly. But I don't think it's trivialising - just listen to what he does with op 17/4! He has all the rhythmic allure of Landowska and Gould. The performances are quite positive emotionally - for Ferenczy these mazurkas are about life. And there's a subtle eneffable emotional undertone - rather introspective, I can't find the words to say more about it.



Another special recording is by Paul von Schilhawsky. Dramatic, colourful, lots of kick, these are some of the least salon style, most dancing, mazurkas I've heard. But it's much more than dancing, Schilhawsky has a distinctive introspective side to his music making - they always seem to touch strange emotions.

I think. I may not feel the same about these ones tomorrow.

Another thing I feel, I don't know if others will agree, is that these recordings benefit from being substantial selections rather than integrals. Part of the art of making a good mazurka performance is to make a selection which fits your style. I get much much more stimulation from these CDs than I do from the compete sets that I've heard.

[Herman]

Sofronitsky's A minor mazurka (68 / 2) is great, in that he doesn't turn it into this washed out perpetuum mobile some performers make it. Just because it has this late opus number doesn't mean Chopin wrote it with death on his mind.

[North Star]

Sofronitsky's A minor mazurka (68 / 2) is great, in that he doesn't turn it into this washed out perpetuum mobile some performers make it. Just because it has this late opus number doesn't mean Chopin wrote it with death on his mind.

I haven't heard anyone do that to it, thank goodness.

[Pat B]

Sofronitsky's A minor mazurka (68 / 2) is great, in that he doesn't turn it into this washed out perpetuum mobile some performers make it. Just because it has this late opus number doesn't mean Chopin wrote it with death on his mind.

According to wikipedia (risky, I know...) that one was written in 1827, making it one of his earliest. It was published posthumously.

[Mandryka]

There are at least two op 68/2s by Sofronitsky -- a studio from 1947 and a live which I tagged as being from a 1949 concert, sounds like it was an encore. They're not the same in terms of conception.

[Mandryka]

This recording contains, amongst other things, 13 mazurkas recorded, I believe, in 1990. The one cited by me above contains 39 mazurkas, recorded I think in 1996. There is some overlap. The performamces are quite different. The earlier is more playful, it suffers from a more agresive piano, and so far it's not excited my imagination as much as the later one.

[Herman]

According to wikipedia (risky, I know...) that one was written in 1827, making it one of his earliest. It was published posthumously.

I know. A lot of these very late opus nrs (such as the E minor nocturne) are really very early works.

[Mandryka]

Yes, three of them actually.  The earliest one is an August 27, 1947 studio recording (on Arlecchino ARL 95, Denon COCO-80815 = COCQ-83672, and Russian Compact Disc RCD 16288).  There are two live recordings of 68/2:  October 20, 1949 and November 21, 1949.  October is on Denon COCO-80149/50 = COCQ-83968/9 and on Vista Vera VVCD-00118-2.  November is on these Denon and Vista Vera CD's, and also on Arkadia 78571, Brilliant Classics BRIL 8975 (CD No.4), Originals SH 858, Palladio PD 4131, and The Piano Library PL 282.  Timings:  2'42 (1947), 2'07 (October 1949), 2'26 (November 1949), but it depends on the editor's handling of the applause.

Was the period between 1947 and 1949 one where he was generally acively revising his interpreations, or is it just something that happens for this one mazurka, or is it explicable by the difference between studio and live (that would be very interesting) or is it that he was always pretty capricious or what?

[Mandryka]

OK, how about a game of Mystery Pianist? This is the mazurka op 59/1. Comments about the performance appreciated too.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_X2GimjrvdPZ3hBNnhOTk81b1k/view?usp=sharing

[kishnevi]

Have no idea of the pianist.  The overall feeling interests me....more like a nocturne, nothing danceable except perhaps in a daydream.  The autumnal wistful feel you mentioned relative to Block is definitely present...so definite that if it is him, there is none of that ambiguity, the extrovert feeling, you also mentioned in connection with him.  This is a very introverted version.

Hmmm, you mentioned Schilhawsky as being introspective.  Is it him?