Customer Reviews

David Helfgott Plays Rachmaninov: Piano Concerto No. 3; Four Preludes; Sonata No. 2

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(33)

 

 

i'll make this brief because it's all pretty much been said and i don't want to pile on...

the movie shine, which i thought was quite well done (although horribly unfair to david's father), inspired me to check out david helfgott's works. thank god i borrowed this from my library instead of wasting any money (yes, i know it's being sold for .01 here) purchasing it.

this poor man is not fit to record hot cross buns, let alone the immeasurably deep and difficult rach3. i haven't heard any of helfgott's other performances, and after hearing this, i pray to god that i never will. this album is simply a disaster.

if you're looking for helfgott, i don't know what to tell you. perhaps his other recordings are not so bad? i can't imagine them being good by any stretch, but this HAS to be as bad as it gets.

if you're looking for rachmaninov's piano concerto no. 3, then i recommend martha argerich's philips release with the berlin radio symphony orchestra, riccardo chailly conducting. a unique performance that unlike helfgott's "unique" performance, is simply a joy to listen to. if you're looking for what many (myself included) consider the perfect example of this masterpiece, go with vladimir horowitz's performance with the new york philharmonic symphony orchestra, sir john barbirolli conducting. this is as good as it gets and even rachmaninov said that horowitz played it better than himself. this recording is often called "the rachminanov third to end all rachmaninov thirds".

actually, just get any rach3 but this one. please.

ok, that wasn't so brief... but this exploitation of a sick, perhaps at one point talented, man fills me with anger.

It's truly sad the number of people here who say they never tried classical music before, but were "turned on" by the Shine movie and this recording. Really great artists are releasing brilliant recordings into the vacuum of public notice every day, and something like this piece of garbage comes along and is hoisted to Classical's Top Ten. All because the people who are weeping over Helfgott and his semi-autobigraphical yarn have never heard classical music before, as they even state in their reviews, but feel compelled, after one listen to one piece by one pianist, to tell the world what a "genius" he is. If they would go out and buy a second CD, one by an artist and not a sideshow talent, they wouldn't be "amazed" and "moved" by this recording, which is not even "amateurish," as someone described it. (An amateur is merely someone who isn't paid money; Mr Helfgott was paid money, and amateurs can play rings around him. He plays passages with utter brittleness, is all over the place with dynamics, and doesn't seem to have a sense of what the music is about--ie, how to build coherently, how to highlight the architecture of the works. To make things worse, often he can't keep up with the orchestra--and the orchestra itself is not very good, by the way. In the Rachmaninoff Sonata he falls apart and simply cannot play the notes. Listen to Zoltán Kocsis if you want a jaw-dropping performance of this work. In fact, just listen to Helfgott's three samples here, and then go to Kocsis' CD of the same work and listen to his samples of almost the same segments. The difference should immediately silence any debate as to whether Helfgott can even competently play the material.

A third year Julliard or Curtis student couldn't get a passing grade turning in a performance like this, let alone a record contract and sold-out performances at Carnegie.) Shame on Gillian Helfgott, David's exploitative partner in this crime. Shame on the producers, both movie and record, for claiming Shine is the story of a destroyed virtuoso who comes back in triumph. The real life story not quite as tremendous, and Helfgott was nothing extraordinary before his breakdown, nor was his repertoire choice of the "Rach 3" all that daring for a young pianist: many of them cut their teeth on it every year. But mostly shame on the public, for being so woefully musically ignorant that they do not notice complete musical incompetence when they hear it.

When Helfgott performed in New York's Carnegie Hall during his "comeback" tour, Isaac Stern was among those in the audience. At intermission he was seen hastily leaving. A newspaper music reviewer shouted to him, asking what he thought of the performance. "No comment" was his only reply.

No stars for this, although Amazon's software forced me to put in one.

This is the worst recording of the Rachamninoff Third Concerto I have ever heard (and I have heard about 25 of them.) The most charitable adjectives I can summon for this performance are hazy amd heavily medicated. I have nothing but sympathy for the trials Mr. Helfgott has had to endure, but I have even even greater sympathy for far more talented musicians who are trying to break into this difficult profession--only to have their hard work usurped by a cinematic sob story. If you want to hear a great Rachmaninoff Third, try Horowitz/Ormandy, Horowitz/Reiner, or Rachmaninoff/Ormandy. Helfgott plays the revised version of the Rachmaninoff Second Sonata. If this is the version you prefer, I suggest Thibaudet's fine performance on Decca. Personally, I feel that the revised version is too condensed (Rachmaninoff felt this way also, and allowed Vladimir Horowitz to create a combination of the original and revised versions). Both the 1968 Sony (lithe, pantherlike, and in excellent sound) and the 1980 RCA (brooding, with closely miked sound) Horowitz versions are my top picks for this work. Helfgott's 15 minutes are over, let's just let these unfortunate recordings rest in peace.

Okay. To those of you below giving this five star reviews and claiming that you know the score by heart, have played it, can play it, etc., please allow me to now call your bluff. If you knew the score, and had experience playing it, there would be basically no reason for you to give this a five star review. You might -- might -- give it two stars out of something like misplaced sympathy, allowing your knowledge of the performer's condition to afford undue sympathy to this recording. I am well aware of the subjective nature of reviewing music but this performance has undeniable, objective and serious problems. It is -riddled- with errors. Missed notes, incorrectly hit notes among the most glaring. -Riddled-.

In the more subjective realm, the dynamics are either plainly non-existent or wildly off track. He has issues keeping up with the orchestra. He is out of synch with the orchestra.

You are giving a five star review to a recording of the Rach 3 where the performer is missing scads of notes and is frequently out of synch with the orchestra! I mean...really!

This recording is, without a doubt in my mind, the worst recording of this piece I have ever heard. I own a number of recordings of the work, and I have a wide range of opinions (my favorite is the 1951 Horowitz...my previous least favorite the latest Kissin), but this one absolutely takes the cake in terms of being poor.

I honestly cannot imagine that anyone with familiarity with this piece would give it 5 stars. Please. Give me a break. Stop lying.

What I got when I listened to this disc is that during the hearing I got very, very much worried about that whether he could complete the whole work or not. It sounds very unbalanced and strange. There is no logical sense of the interpretation, no structural feeling. I'm very impressed by David's story, but music is music, I must say sorry.

This is without question the worst performance of these works you could possible own. The piano playing is immeasurably poor and the sound isn't much better for 1995. I actually laughed out loud during the cadenza at the end of the 1st movement. Rent it from the library (like I did) or steal it from some "Shine" fan for a good laugh but don't waste your money on such garbage.

I now own at least 6 recordings of this concerto: Horowitz's 1951, Horowitz's video w/ Mehta conducting, Argerich, Kissin, Helfgott, and the composer's recording.
Helfogtt is a disgrace to this music. If you saw the movie and liked the Rach 3, then go out and buy either Horowitz or Argerich (I am torn between the 2, they are both excellent). Helfgott's recording was the first piano concerto I owned and I naively thought it was amazing. 300 classical piano cd's later, i laugh at my former opinion. it is a clumsy account, with no structure. there is no flow between the movements and all technical difficulties are slapped out irraticaly.
The movie is touching and the music clips are ok, but if you are being lulled into classical music because of it, why not introduce yourself to the true masters and not this hack. If you are looking for music from the romantic era you cant go wrong with horowitz, argerich, pletnev, rubinstein, richter (a little iffy), or ogdon (my favorite, but hard to find).

This is the first recording of Rach 3 I had ever heard, and after listening to it a few times I knew something wasn't right. So I bought other recordings. The cadenza and the climaxes are all bad and confusing, but there are some interesting parts. It's nice to hear different interpretations of those passages where the pianist is given the freedom of rubatto or accelerando(sp?). It's not a very good recording, but it's worth listening to for different ideas if you're interested in this piece.

So I bought the Helfgott CD, like so many others, after watching the heartbreaking Shine movie. Let me put it short: It's a new CD in my collection, but that is all it is.

This is quite honestly a horrible recording. The opening of the Alla breve movement is filled with so many errors that I simply can not count them. The Allegro ma non tanto movement portrays a number of awfully struck chords, together with some peculiarities in the cadenza where fortissimos turn into pianissimos and vice versa.

I feel bad for Helfgott whenever I listen to this recording.

My personal collection of Rach 3 CD:s, although not excessively extensive, includes recordings that I would recommend and which make the Helfgott album seem poor, at best. For example Leif Ove Andsnes' magnificent recording (with Paavo Berglund as conductor, on the EMI label), Bernd Glemser's - a very strict and accurate interpretation although not too exciting (Naxos), Martha Argerich's recordings because of her forceful way of attack the notes or Byron Janis - sometimes out of tempo cause he plays too fast(Mercury), and Ashkenazy - his recordings from the sixties... just to name a few.

Helfgott just does not make it to their level. And I am very sad for his sake. The reason I still give this album two stars is because the 2nd Piano Sonata (also included) is actully quite OK. Although I prefer Helene Grimaud's recent recording on Deutsche Grammophon.

I have listened to many interpretations of the Rach 3, and I am still forever searching for the perfect one. This recording with Helfgott, made around the same time as the movie was being conceptualised is a little messy. The Danish Philharmonic Orchestra who must have had a lot of patience dealing with Helfgott, are practically perfect in this interpretation. Helfgott on the other hand is sloppy. Especially in the intensive parts his play is a mess, as he muddles notes together. Although David Helfgott is an extremely remarkable musical talent, as Shine suggests, he is not known as a great pianist. All in all, the Rach 3 is the only thing worth listening to on this CD, but it is not interesting unless you are collecting Rach 3 interpretations.There are many better interpretations out there.