Customer Reviews

Bartok: The Piano Concertos / Anda, Fricsay, Radio Symphony Orchestra Berlin

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This classic set of Bartok's three piano concertos is also available in Anda's volume of "Great Pianists" on Philips, but I think this DG transfer is slightly superior. The recorded sound favors the piano somewhat over the orchestra - I could wish for a little closer orchestral perspective - but overall the sound here is excellent. Here are a few notes on both the music and the performances:

#1. Composed in 1926, this concerto is a muscular and rather dissonant work. The second mvt. Andante is a spooky dialogue between piano and percussion that seems to be a precursor to Bartok's chamber masterpiece: the Sonata for 2 Pianos and Percussion. This performance is one of the two finest I have heard; the other was on Bartok LP 313 (the label of Bartok's son Peter, a gifted recording engineer), with pianist Leonid Hambro and the Zimbler Sinfonietta conducted by Robert Mann (better known as the 1st violinist of the Juilliard Quartet, which left stunning recordings of the Six String Quartets). The mono sound on that disc (now available on CD) is close-up and clear as a bell, with a 2nd mvt. that is downright frightening in its primitive, wailing loneliness.

#2. Completed in 1931, this concerto strikes me as the finest of the three - it's far more contrapuntal and surely the hardest to play. In the 1st mvt., the piano takes charge from the beginning and plays almost continuously, while the strings are rather oddly silent throughout. Anda here is incredibly bold and extroverted - he obviously had technique to burn! The eerie 2nd mvt opening in the strings will sound familiar to anyone who has savored TV sci-fi of the 1960's: a very similar passage was employed by Dominic Frontiere in his music for "The Outer Limits." This mvt. is half Adagio and half Scherzo, and again the piano predominates. The Finale is an elaborate rondo which cleverly transforms the thematic/rhythmic elements heard in the 1st mvt.

Anda and Fricsay are wonderfully in sync throughout. Another stunning account of this work is the "live" 1969 concert reading by Claude Helffer, with Ernest Bour leading the Orchestre National de France on deleted INA Vogue 672006. That's a CD worth seeking out: I think its 2nd mvt. is a bit more compelling than Anda/Fricsay's. It is coupled with a really extraordinary live 1950 account of the Viola Concerto by William Primrose (for whom it was written), and the most savagely dramatic "Miraculous Mandarin" I have ever heard. And perhaps DG Westminster will get around to a CD re-issue of the c.1953 recording of Concertos 2 & 3 with Hungarian Edith Farnadi (daintier and more pointillistic than Anda), with remarkable conducting by Hermann Scherchen (his very slow introduction in the 2nd mvt. is disquietingly eerie). I have not heard the Sviatoslav Richter/Lorin Maazel account (EMI) - it is said to be superb.

#3. This is the only piano concerto that was not commissioned. The sick and impoverished Bartok wanted to give his wife Ditta a work with exclusive performance rights attached so as to insure her financial future. All but 18 bars of the concerto's orchestration was completed when Bartok was rushed to the hospital on 22 Sept. 1945 - he died there 4 days later. His protege Tibor Serly completed it (as he also did with the Viola Concerto). This is a gorgeous piece of music - it is Bartok's most romantic and meditative concerto. There is a subtle interplay of folk tune elements, and the slow mvt. Adagio Religioso seems like a humble prayer (almost Coplandesque in its simple, valedictory quality), with the usual demons almost at bay.

Anda and Fricsay give a performance that is both virile and sensitive; in many respects, it contains this set's finest moments. Fricsay constantly dmonstrates what an insightful and authoritative Bartok interpreter he was - if you haven't heard his Concerto for Orchestra or MSPC (both on DG), you are missing some terrific music making. Although only in mono, those recordings are among the finest ever, along with Reiner in the former and Mravinsky and Reiner in the latter.

For collectors, there is also a very interesting #3 on Dante CD 158, which features a c.1948 recording by Tatiana Nikolaieva with the USSR Radio under Nikolai Anosov (who, incidentally, was father of conductor Gennady Rozhdestvensky). It's in pretty good sound given the source and has some fine pianism and very plangent wind playing. It is coupled with an uncut version of Tchaikovsky's 2nd Piano Concerto (my favorite reading).

To sum it up: this DG set is a superb testimonial to two great Hungarian artists who shared a love of Bartok's music (they performed the 2nd piano concerto together some 60 times in concert prior to making this recording). What a tragedy that both of them were so short-lived: Fricsay died of cancer at 48 and Anda passed away at age 54.

I cannot say what are the definitive versions of Bartok's piano concertos, but this is an amazing set. The orchestra and soloist are exceptional, never afraid to be as light or heavy as the music demands, with an intuitive sensitivity to the score's demands.

Piano Concerto no.2 is my favorite. With his second concerto, Bartok wanted to make it "lighter" and more pleasant to the audience. However, he also desired to remain in the same sphere of compositional style as the first. Thus, he makes no compromises with popular taste, sacrificing nothing in the way of vision or complexity. Although technically similar in many respects, they are different in important ways. Compared to the first's impulsive, prickly development of ideas, the second asserts itself more meticulously, like Bartok's middle string quartets. The first movement is starkly arranged (winds, percussion, piano) but melodically delightful and rhythmically varied. Pianist Géza Anda's approach on the second concerto is in perfect command of the technical elements and also abstracts like the playfulness and eagerness. The deft but sweet conveyance of the second movement's critical presto is remarkable, and the return to adagio in the final section unleashes colossi of dissonant chords over rumbling percussion takes one's breath away. The final movement is best of all: deriving most of its material from the first movement, it is viciously dissonant and rhythmically aggressive. It is also a throwback to the Baroque period with its emphasis on contrapuntal technical and concise thematic development.

The first concerto also factored into this development of merging folksongs with baroque tradition. But despite Bartok's obvious commitment as an ethnomusicologist for Eastern Europe, "folk songs" for Bartok were did not only mean popular songs of the Carpathian Basin, but also other ancient musical traditions like African drum music. This is an important influence on the composition core of the first piano concerto. The rhythmical proto-idea appears at first on piano and brass (low-registers) and from here numerous thematic evolutions unfold. Long considered the most expressive of all instruments, Bartok shapes the music from the percussive qualities of the piano. The percussive aspects of the piano were often important to him. Percussion rises to a key role in this piece, as in the early part of the second movement, a tense exchange between percussions and piano. Then, an exhilarating piano ostinato in 3/8 for many bars, spliced and developed multitexturally and with melodic variation. These are powerful Bartok moments.

The third concerto is less dissonant, "brighter", and more "classical" than the other two. Yet Bartok's spritely melodies are captivating and the piano parts especially imaginative. The second movement is very powerful, with a slow and sparse texture but it develops into a complex formation of musical pinpricks and fragmentary melodies. It is less compelling than the other two, but it reflects a profound, deep atmosphere of uneasy peace.

Ferenc Fricsay was noted for his interpretations of Bartok and Mozart (and even wrote a book about the two composers). Fricsay and Anda were graduates of the Franz Liszt Conservatory in Budapest, where their teachers included Bartok and Kodaly. The third concerto is a personal favorite of mine, it was Bartok's farewell present to his wife, written while he was dying of leukemia. It is one of his most poetic compositions.

This performance is a high quality recording in every respect. The performance is lyrical where lyricism is called for, and full of driving rhythms that are exciting without being crass. Fricsay's Bartok generally ranks among my favorite readings, and this set of Bartok's three great concerti is among the best of his best.

This is one of those legendary re-releases from the golden halls of Deutsche Grammophon-dom that is sure to make you shiver with amazement. The sound-job here is incredible. I simply couldn't believe that this stuff was done in 1960. There's not even the tiniest TRACE of hiss here. I've heard recordings from 2003 that impressed me less than this.

Bartók's three phenomenal piano concertos metamorphose into magnficent and debilitatingly mind-blowing putty in the hands of Ferenc Fricsay and Géza Anda. Bartók's compatriots were probably more influential than anybody else in preserving and in some cases establishing his reputation after his death, above all in the German-speaking countries, which had been intellectually zapped after World War II. These DG recordings from 1960 and 1961 are explosive testimony to Fricsay and Anda's brilliance. Bartók's concertos pound and pulsate with orchestal thump and shimmer with pianistic glitter like you just wouldn't believe.

Mind-expanding music, coupled with a totally revelatory recording. Miss it and die!

Anda's great recordings of Bartok's piano concerti sound lush and warm with passion, due to Deutsche Grammophon's image-bit remastering. He sees Bartok's music as part of an unbroken chain leading back to Schumann and Liszt, and offers performances that are steeped in lyricism and drama. Fricsay is a suitable accompanist, conducting the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra with much affection for Bartok's scores, yet without overwhelming Anda's playing with the enormous forces he can muster from the orchestra. While this might not be the perfect Bartok piano concerti cycle, it is nevertheless one worth owning.

Who else can perform Bartok piano concertos like Geza Anda and Ferenc Fricsay, with an electrifying Deutsche Grammophon sound?

I have only heard these piano concertos played by Yefim Bronfman/Salonen and Huseyin Sermet/Yoshinori Nishiwaki. I was truly impressed when I heard this recording with Anda and Fricsay for the first time.

I would not want to hear any other recording after this one: it is incredible how much they enjoyed working together, those two Hungarian compatriots, how much they loved the composer. The result is the most thrilling and harmonious performance of these Bartok piano concertos.

I have never heard Anda play something so contemporary, with such passion and intensity. I first fell in love with his live performances of Chopin's Etudes, and especially with his Schumann, even with the bad Testament sound recorded in the 50's.

Deustche Grammophon has issued a Centenary Collection 1966 with Geza Anda performing the terrific "Davidsbuendlertaenze, Op.6" by Schumann in good studio sound. (Recently, Boris Berezovsky has recorded the same composition with Teldec, equally a fine performance, maybe even more romantic.)

I also enjoy Anda playing Grieg piano concerto with a gorgeous sound, conducted by Rafael Kubelik, Deutsche Grammophon's collection du millenaire - that I bought from France.

This recording captures all the excitement of these three wonderful, perfectly distinct one from another, and yet all unmistakeably Bartókian, pieces. All the excitement, the musicality, the dance, the lyricism, the enchanting night-music, the muscular folk-rhythms. I have long loved these three pieces; all the recordings I heard before fell short in some way, though some were very fine indeed. In this recording, the soloist and the orchestra work together, breathe together, dance together ... which testifies to the harmony between soloist and conductor, and the unity of intent between conductor and orchestra ... all the more remarkable with such demanding scores as these. This recording is a monument in the art of the concerto.

I have owned several other versions of this but now I just own this one . Having listened to this music for 30 years , this one is the benchmark for all the others that come down the pike imo.

I should state that this review is primarily in regards to the 2nd concerto which is one of the most emotionally important all all classical works to me and the one that I know best.

I was introduced (putting it mildly) to the 2nd concerto with the Sandor recording with Gielen and the Vienna Sympnony on Turnabout in the early '70s. In the 90's, I purchased the Pollini recording with Abaddo and Chicago and truly love it.

After all the accolades for this performace--it reportedly being the "benchmark" and such--I couldn't fathom why I didn't have it--budgets not withstanding. I was in need of a Bartok 2nd fix so I purchased it.

On listening, I was extremely disappointed in that I had no emtional response to it. I listened again and again, and compared it to other recordings.

My conclusion is that the conducting is heavy handed, the orchestra is weak, and for this work, you need great conducting and orchestral playing as well as a piano master of the first rank.

The second concerto, while being brilliant in it's total archecture, is filled with great "moments" and Fricsay, for the most part, either plows through the moments or overdoes them so they are distracting. Examples are in the 3rd movement at about 3:50 when the brass have a brief but full chordal figure that then crescendoes to the next section. Fricsay first takes the figure way too broadly and then puts a subito piano prior to the crescendo for the last chord of the sequence. This is not in the score and both the tempo and unneccessary subito piano totally disrupt the energy that has been building. Another example, in the first movement, is at the very end where, again, the brass have a figure prior to the last line. Fricsay basically makes what should be a 16th note from a series 16th notes preceding it sound twice as fast--and ruins the phrase.

I know this could be considered nit-picking, but the performance as a whole is full of these lapses and ruins the work as a whole. I also haven't really addressed Anda who sounds great from what I can tell--but I'm so distracted by the rest of it. I know one can get used to certain performances, but to me, this is more than just subtle differences in interpretation. To me, it's just not musical!

I just don't understand how this performance gets the accolades it does. Benchmark? I don't think so.

The fervent sense of dramatis personae in these difficult passages of these dissonant piano concerts demands the most exigent domain of the instrument as well a notable conductor.
When Bartok stated in 1905 : The dissonance ` s empire is mine , certainly he was so far from being lying .
Ferenc Fricsay and Geza Anda gave the best of their craftsmanship to record one of the most notable and above all idiomatic readings of these concerts .
But besides , if you get the Piano Concerts with Gyorgy Sandor (The Complete Piano Concerts with Michael Gielen in the fifties) and a hard to find recording with Fricsay in 1955 with The Vienna Synphony , you will have the essential spirit of this notable composers . But these recordings are priority.
In addition , I recommend you a hidden and two distant recordings of Sandor Ormandy in the Bartok Premiere Third piano and the historic Barok Premiere Third Piano concerto in Europe given for the couple Louis Kentner - Adrian Boult . There was an outstanding Hungarian pianist in the thirties named Edith Farnadi who recorded an excels Liszt but I have got nothing about Bartok , but after listening to her it will be hard to fail ; as well any recording made for Annie Fisher , Zoltan Kocsis and more recently Andras Schiff .
It is not a mere casuality all these named performers are Hungarian . The only point to remark is to these last interpreters that to make a journey with Bela Bartok demands a conduction and such level of commitment that hardly you will be able to find after Fricsay and Kertesz 's deaths .
You may argue than Georg Solti and Istvan Kertesz were remarkable conductors. Yes indeed but I have always thought Solti was an overrated director and besides Solti and Kertesz established with Bartok a distant approach . Solti conducted more Orchestral pieces than Kertsesz but ironically they never found a high caliber pianist to play Bartok piano concertos
Acquire this set . It will reward you. I give you my word.