Customer Reviews

Bartók: Sonata for Two Pianos & Percussion / Brahms: Variations on a Theme by Joseph Haydn for 2 Pianos, Op. 56b

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The Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion is (along with the more popular Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta) the pinnacle of Bartok's fascination with exploring the percussive timbres of the piano and the expressive capacity of percussion. The pianos of Sir Georg Solti and Murray Perahia and the percussion section (3 kettledrums, xylophone, 2 side drums (one without snares), cymbals, suspended cymbals, bass drum, triangle and tam-tam) of David Corkhill and Evelyn Glennie are pretty much equals.

The result is a propulsive, thorny, cerebral, rhythmically and harmonically intricate masterpiece, which exudes a distinct mood of mystery. Listening to it, I can't help but feel it must have been a major influence on the great Cecil Taylor and his school of violently percussive and dense avant-garde/free piano improvising. Although relatively obscure, this is as stunning as anything I've heard from Bartok's range of unique masterpieces (I think I've heard them all except for the String Quartets).

The performances are stellar all around. The quality of the sound engineering and recording should impress even the fussiest audiophiles.

The Brahms piece is very beautiful, but listening to it straight after Bartok's Sonata is a bit of an anti-climax, as it is much more timid and conventional.

I bought this CD for the Bartok, which is excellent as expected. But I was surprised to discover my love for the Haydn variations by Brahms and performed with lovely vigour on this CD.

A worthwhile purchase!

In their recent Great Performances reissue series, Sony has sensibly combined this reading of the Bartok Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion with the rest of Perahia's Bartok recordings, which were previously in a three-CD box of miscellaneous composers. The pairing we have here, the two-paino arrangement of Brahms's Haydn Variations, isn't that strongly performed by Solti and Perahia. Tempos are sluggish, and the second piano--who I assume is Solti--sounds clumsy. I think the work is too difficult to bring off even by great musicians who aren't regular partners.

The outstanding feature of the Bartok performance is the percussion. The deaf virtuoso Evelyn Glennie went on to become an international star. Both percussoinists are well recorded, and they play with exactness and impact. The wide stereo separation puts each piano in its own channel--I don't know which is Solti and which Perahia, however--with the percussion spread out over a wide stage behind them. That's a good way to do it, giving us a recreation of Bartok's precise seating instructions.

Having heard the Bartok sonata live as well as on records, I find that the percussive quality of the painos becomes jarring when there's no hall ambience to absorb it. You feel assualted at home, and the clash of cymbals and tam tam isn't so much thrilling (as it is in concert) as noisily irritating. Microphones have a long way to go to equal the human ear. Having said that, this Sony release is the best recorded of the five versions I've either owned or heard, so I can accept the somewhat underplayed piano parts.

I assume most people purchase this CD because of the Bartok, as did I, but after listening to the Brahms many times, I think it is worth emphasizing the worth of this portion of the CD. Brahms originally wrote this piece for two pianos, with the intention of orchestrating it subsequently. I believe that at this time, his ability to write for piano surpassed greatly his string and orchestral writing ability. The orchestral version, although quite masterful, doesn't really use strings in the optimal way. On the other hand, the piano version, with its ringing, sometimes percussive chords, is a profound sonic experience, and Perahia and Solti do it absolute justice. While they use the piano in impressive way as a percussion instrument, they also get the most delicate color possible out of the legato passages. Every phrase is sculpted masterfully, with repeats bringing a unique viewpoint to the first time through, so much so that they do not sound like repeats at all.

-A music lover from New York

This was the first recoding I had of this masterwork by Bela Bartók, quite unique in its genre and one of his most personal compositions.

A long time I thought this was a very, very fine performing of the Sonata. Now, after listening some other versions (Lebeque, Argerich...), but, overall, Kontarsky's one, I really think it's a good recording but not between the best available.

Bartók's use of the piano was very close to percussion, quite the strongest part of the sonata, even harder than the percussionists in some parts of the score. This is very typical from the time of Bartók's First Piano Concert, that has a second movement quite in the same style of this Sonata. Kontarsky brothers, like Pollini or Zimerman (both in them recordings of the First Concert for DG) has shown how to play a much more strong, powerful and bartokian piano on them performing.

Solti knows Bartók's language very well, but much more better as conductor than as a pianist, and Perahia is clearly out of repertoire and style.

Even so, it's a quite good recording, but not the best, in my opinion. Deutsche Grammophon should think about releasing one more time Kontarky's version, the best ever recorded.

Good DDD sound and poor booklet.

Amazon, please correct the listings. It's not Hayden! It's HAYDN.

That said, this is an awesome performance of the Bartok, a very difficult piece to a) play b) perform and c) coordinate. Perahia at his best.