Customer Reviews

Alfred Cortot 2 -Great Pianists of the Century

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Naxos has released Cortot's 1926 recording of the Chopin Preludes Op.28. (Naxos 8.111023) The Naxos sound is very good (engineered by Mark Obert-Thorn Himself). A real bargain cd!

The Chopin Preludes Op.28 on this Philips 2-cd set are those recorded by Cortot in 1933-34. My impression is that the sound here is a touch warmer and more open than on the Naxos cd.

This is volume 2 of Cortot's art as preserved in the Philips Great Pianists collection, a series now unfortunately deleted from the catalog and now available only by online purchases arranged privately or by sources like Amazon. I have been a longtime admirer of Cortot, a pianist primarily committed to presenting a powerfully stated and personal view of the music rather than one absolutely note-perfect. His recordings, this one included, inevitably contain a few wrong notes and smudged passages, but they are often uniquely revealing and powerfully effective. This program is a good example of his art. The program offers typical and revealing accounts of Franck's Prelude Choral and Fugue and the Prelude Aria and Finale as well as his Symphonic Variations with the LPO conducted by Landon Ronald. Thee is also a colorful and smashingly powerful account of Saint-Saëns' Piano Concerto 4 in C minor, ably accompanied by Charles Munch and an unnamed British orchestra, as great a performance of the work as ever recorded. The 2CDs in the set also include Chopin's Preludes op. 28, complete, Ravel's Sonatine, and Debussy's Preludes, Book 1. They are all taken from 78rpm sources but have been digitally edited by Philips to reduce surface hiss and other noises so skilfully as to reveal little or nothing to indicate the fact. They are not cheap; my set obtained from Amazon, cost about $42.00 for the 2CD set, for a "used" copy that bore exactly no sign that it had ever been played after leaving the Philips shop. It was worth every penny, and I would never part with it for any price. By this time you should have observed that I recommend it unequivocally.

Cortot is a wonderful interpreter, and his readings of Franck's works are unsurpassed. Buy it.