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Taneyev and Schumann: Piano Quintets (Signum)
★★★★☆
Over 40 years and in a powerful variety of recordings, Peter Donohoe has by no means did not problem and shock the listening public. From Bach to Busoni, Prokofiev to Pejacevic, and on half a dozen labels, the Mancunian percussion-turned-pianist has trodden his personal decided path, manner off the crushed monitor. He’s very a lot a My Means pianist and I’ve discovered down the years to belief his judgment.
Positioned joint second within the Moscow 1982 Tchaikovsky competitors (the place no first prize was given), Donohoe developed an affinity for Russians of all kinds and eras. The composer Sergei Taneyev, usually dismissed as Tchaikovsky’s favorite pupil, is seldom credited with a voice of his personal. His quintet, dated 1911, is rooted in Schumann and Brahms, with a Tchaikovsky funereal motion and a sure Parisian whimsy. It’s assuredly the summit of his achievement.
Within the fingers of Peter Donohoe and the Sacconi Quartet, it comes over as a sigh for a dying epoch of beginner music-making at residence, without delay wistful, civilised, stirring and particular person — a masterpiece in miniature by a precisionist composer who discovered neither love nor mass recognition in his self-contained life. Taneyev died 4 years later after catching pneumonia on the grand funeral of Alexander Scriabin.
The Schumann quintet of 1844, an archetype of its style, receives a pensive presentation, its lyrical overcoats underpinned by rustlings of disquiet and self-doubt. Robert Schumann wrote it for a Russian tour along with his new spouse, Clara. What Donohoe brings forth is its centrality in Russian perceptions of the function of chamber music in a altering society. Sheer magnificence apart, it’s onerous to think about a extra considerate conception for a brand new recording, issued on the very finish of the age of economic recording.
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Norman Lebrecht is among the most widely-read commentators on music, tradition and cultural politics. He’s a daily presenter on BBC Radio 3 and a contributor to the Wall Road Journal, Bloomberg, Standpoint, Sinfini and different publications. His weblog, Slipped Disc, is among the many most generally learn cultural websites on-line, breaking unique tales and campaigning in opposition to human abuse and acts of injustice within the cultural industries.
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