Scriabin: le Poème De L'Extase/Piano Concerto/Prometheus

Alexander Nikolayevich Scriabin (Artist), Lorin Maazel (Artist), Vladimir Ashkenazy (Artist), Ambrosian Singers (Artist) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (October 25, 1990)
• SPARS Code: ADD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Decca
• ASIN: B0000041RH
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #53,256 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #25 in Music > Classical > Historical Periods > Modern, 20th, & 21st Century > Composers > Scriabin, Alexander

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An Essential Scriabin CD!, February 12, 2005

By 

Paul Rossi "Paul Rossi" (Walla Walla, WA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Scriabin: le Poème De L'Extase/Piano Concerto/Prometheus (Audio CD)

Recently, I had the pleasure of listening to this CD at a local college listening library. I had heard the recordings before, but I wanted to refresh the works in my mind because they are such important works in the musical repertoire.

Vladimir Ashkenazy gives great, emotional performances of the Scriabin Piano Concerto in F-sharp Minor and "Prometheus." His playing is deep, insightful, romantic, and powerful.

Ashkenazy plays the Piano Concerto with power and dramatic flair. His technique is formidable, but it never reached the level of, say, Murray Perahia, Radu Lupu or Krystian Zimerman. Not all the notes are clear, and Ashkenazy tends to get loud and "bangy" many times. However, his forces at key climaxes is usually warranted. Maazel and the orchestra give beautiful, powerful, expert accompaniments. Their sound is full and red-blooded. Unfortunately, the mono sound does not do justice to the performance, and the acoustic is a bit blurred and stuffy.

Maazel and the orchestra give an expert reading of the "Poem of Ecstasy." It brings out the strange, mystical harmonies that fascinated and occupied Scriabin. Maazel does an excellent job leading the orchestra through the quiet, mysterious beginning to the end, a spectacular, climax rarely encountered in music. You must hear it to believe it. It is completely over the top!! The solo trumpet, flute, and violin are outstanding.

"Promotheus" is giving a very convincing reading. Of course, Ashkenazy plays the piano part, and his contribution is great. Maazel and the players do a fantastic job bringing out the orchestral textures and bizarre Scriabin harmonies. It is another incredible musical experience.

Overall, I highly recommend this CD. I wrote a review on the Anatol Ugorski/Pierre Boulez recording of these same works. I have a definite preference for the Ugorski/Boulez performances, but these are wonderful, perhaps essential, too. Ashkenazy and Maazel emphasize power, emotion, and sonic output, while Ugorski and Boulez emphasize clarity, musical line, and precision. The choice is yours.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Essential recording, April 3, 2001

By 

Josef Krebs (Seattle) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Scriabin: le Poème De L'Extase/Piano Concerto/Prometheus (Audio CD)

Superb playing from Ashkenazy in the concerto - tender and warm in the center movement, harsh and angular where called for - and wonderful conducting from Maazel in the bigger two numbers. Especially hair-raising is the "poem of ecstasy", pairing the Cleveland Orchestra's amazing technique with Maazel's pounding passion and x-ray precision. Thrilling music, thrillingly recorded. Don't bother to buy another.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars In absence of Badura Skoda' s crowned version this is a well deserved second choice!, November 18, 2005

By 

Hiram Gomez Pardo (Valencia, Venezuela) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Scriabin: le Poème De L'Extase/Piano Concerto/Prometheus (Audio CD)

I must regret the incredible forgetfulness that still seems to persist in which concerns the imminent release of the most superb version ever made of this Concerto under the prodigious hands and artistic commitment offered by the legendary Austrian pianist Paul Badura Skoda in the Fifties directed by Rodzinski the Philharmonic Symphonic Orchestra. I still keep a copy in vinyl and I will have to make my own transfer to CD format.

In this sense the offered performance of Ashkenazy is a very worthy version that remains to a considerable distance from the 'previously commented version. There is something undefined in the craft of this consecrated pianist, maybe his excess of intellectualism and rigid coldness interpretative, but this Scriabin Concert needs to be played with ardor and vital sensitivity, the Romanticism approach does not fit accurately in the conception of this work, because the Romantic Russian mood includes besides an invisible nostalgia that needs to be underlined despite it is not visible at the score, but that guarantees the adequate achievement, and despite I am not a musician, this opinion is supported by the wide domain of his entire piano works that somehow give us some determining clues.

Go for this in absence of Paul Badura Skoda performance.

The rest of the CD is very intersting. Maazel 's steeled approach fits accurately in this case.