Customer Reviews

Villa-Lobos: Piano Music Vol. 1 / Rubinsky

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4 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

I was already a fan of Villa Lobos' music and I really enjoyed this CD . The pieces were well chosen and the piano playing is great. The music is full of contrasts: soft and strong, playful and sad, rebellious and harmonic. As a Brazilian, I know these songs from childhood and to hear them in this CD is a real pleasure, particularly "Nesta Rua" and "Terezinha de Jesus". The pianist is flawless both in her technique and in her interpretation of the pieces. Her identification with the music is so complete that we feel her enjoyment in playing them.

The move from the large-scale orchestra we may be more familiar with to the piano does not mean that the music of Villa-Lobos loses any of its energy, rhythm, colour or beauty. The two major works here, 'A Prole do Bebe' (the Baby's family) and 'Cirandas' (a Portuguese dance) evoke the world of childhood, and are said to belong to the traditon of Schumann and Tchaikovsky, but the warm colours and rich harmonies are more tropical than those chilly Europeans, with Villa-Lobos brilliantly incorporating and reworking Brazilian folk material. The first wittily depicts the personalities of a child's dolls; the set of dances push their good-natured skittishness into real emotion at times. The 'Homage a Chopin' give a famously restrained and reflective idiom some sunny and dramatic virtuosity. Brazilian pianist Sonia Rubinsky knows these pieces and their influences well, and responds to them with intelligence, empathy and humour.

When Villa Lobos listened for the first time the works of Debussy and Stravinsky ( The Russian Ballets of Diaghlev danced in Rio de Janeiro in 1913 and 1917) he found the way to create something really adequate to involve Brazilian authentic tunes . The first important period of Villa Lobos as a composer involve two series of works: The Prole do Bebê ( No 1 and No 2) and the Choros. Prole do Bebê is full of Pentatonic and whole tone scales, and the Harmony of some of the pieces are deeply influenced by Stravinsky: The Polichinelo is a Brazilian brother of the Russian white/black harmony of Petrushka. For the first time one Brazilian composer was proud of our authentic songs and he placed these lovely melodies in the middle of a very sophisticated piano writing and with new harmonies that fitted wonderfully with his purposes. The Cirandas is also involved with the child's world. I would like to remember that The Cirandas are not important only as a wonderful composition, but I'm sure too that without this work a lot of authentic folkloric melodies would be lost ,as our childs don't play no more singing these melodies. Times of globalization...
The Prole No 1 and the Cirandas are among the most often played and recorded piano works of Heitor Villa Lobos. The references for the Prole do Bebe No 1 are of course Aline van Barentzen , that recorded the Prole 1 and 2 in Paris for EMI in the presence of the composer ( unfortunately the CD version of the album "Villa Lobos par lui meme" doesn't include this important recording, that was present in the LP version), Nelson Freire( unfortunately he recorded only the Prole 1) and Anna Stella Schic . For the Cirandas the references are again Anna Stella Schic ( the only pianist that recorded the complete works for piano by Villa Lobos), Roberto Szidon and Caio Pagano.
I'm profoundly satisfied with this first record of this important project ( It will be a series of 9 Cds, I believe). Sonia Rubinsky plays very well, and I would like to prize her attitude about the fidelity towards the printed score. As the Prole do Bebe No 1 includes some very often played compositions , they are normally played with some liberties and "traditions". As Mahler used to say, "Tradition is Schlamperei". I really prefer to listen these pieces as Sonia Rubinsky plays: as they are written. One can prefer the exceptional musicality of Nelson Freire in the Prole, or the analytical sound of Caio Pagano in the Cirandas. But Sonia is a first rate pianist too. She has a wonderful sonority .With her flawless musicality we can say that this integral began as a new reference in Villa Lobos discography .

Villa-Lobos, who is of course the great composer of Brazil, has a less secure place in the history of modern music of the West, so it is good that his art is getting a reappraisal, with various record labels committed to issuing cycles of his works-the symphonies and string quartets, for example. Villa-Lobos wrote a great deal of piano music that isn't heard as much as it used to be, so the present CD, the first in a two-volume series (maybe there will be more) from Naxos is welcome indeed.

If Ginastera is the Bartok of the pampas, Villa-Lobos, in his piano music at least, might be seen as early Prokofiev or Stravinsky transported to the Amazon. As with Ginastera, there is much of surface glitter and of grit, but the emotional depths that Ginastera plumbs in his more inward music seems sorely lacking in much of this piano music by Villa-Lobos. Maybe inwardness wasn't on the composer's agenda as he tried to recreate the world of childhood in these pieces. But I wish he had taken his cue from Schumann, whose "Kinderscenen" is great music primarily because it doesn't shy away from the truth that childhood isn't all fun and games, though the troubling dissonances that intrude on the surface serenity of Villa-Lobos' "The Countess" and "What Beautiful Eyes!" hint at this fact.

Anyway, there is certainly a place for brilliance and grit, which Villa-Lobos' music has in abundance, and especially if you don't listen to all these pieces at one sitting, you will appreciate the freshness and liveliness of Villa-Lobos' invention. I think you'll also find Villa-Lobos' brand of musical primitivism, which intelligently combines European modernism and native New World musical elements, intriguing. You'll probably be amused, too, by "Little Black Doll" and "Look at the Pretty Birdy," which start off as perfect Debussy knockoffs but quickly absorb Villa-Lobos' own Latin-tinged idiom. Certainly, it's easy to see why the Petrouchka-influenced "Punch" from "A Prole do Bebe" suite was at one time an encore favorite with pianists such as Villa-Lobos' champion Artur Rubinstein. Then there is the jazzy "In This Street" from "Cirandas," which illustrates Villa-Lobos' unique assimilation of European and Brazilian popular music.

Sonia Rubinsky brings the requisite pianistic chops to this recital. She has great technique and finds no hurdles she can't manage in Villa-Lobos' sometimes grueling keyboard writing. But she also brings delicacy, charm, and wit to her assignment as well, which breathes life and purpose into the quieter pieces like "What Beautiful Eyes!" A first-rate sound recording, too, from Fisher Hall in Santa Rosa, California. This disc is recommended without hesitation.

I have heard Villa-Lobos' A prole do Bebê in various interpretations, but I cannot remember it ever has impressed me more than in Sonia Rubinsky's recording of it, which is utterly virtuoso (I mean a natural virtuosity without bravado)and at the same time very warm and colorful. As in `A prole do Bebê' the `Cirandas', on the same record, show a surpring succesion of various moods, dreamy or exciting, tender or fiery and passionate. There is a continuous tension between strong rhythm and free flowing melody, and a sonority that is very well preserved in the excellent recording. She does not `hammer' the Cirandas as if they were written by Bartòk - a pitfall that seems not altogether imaginary. This is only the first of a series of discs on which Sonia Rubinsky will play Villa Lobos' complete piano works. I hope it won't take too long before we will be able to hear them all. In a broadcast by The Radio Suisse Romande I heard a marvelous sample of the net yet available second volume, which I am eagerly awaiting, as well as the other volumes.

I love Villa-Lobos and have much of his orchestral & chamber music - but just getting into the solo piano works, just own a Christina Ortiz single CD - now have 2 of the Naxos series w/ Sonia Rubinsky (and one more in the mail); these recordings have received excellent-superlative reviews, so I have no idea how one could rate this disc 1* (which to me in a 5* Amazon rating means that it was HATED!) - I would rate a recording 1* only if the performer fumbled the keys and/or the sound recording was dreadful; neither is true here. If you are interested in this composer's solo piano music, please read the more positive reviews, checkout the Naxos website which often has many 'summary' reviews; finally, MusicWeb International has some outstanding comments on this performer in these recordings. Please don't judge a purchase based on one miscalculated 'poor' rating - these are well done and at a bargain price - but I would suggest doing just one at a time - V-L was such a prolific composer (and explore his other music which was my entry into his sound world) - good pickings & report back! :-)

If you have not heard other music from Villa-Lobos than the well known Bachianas Brasileiras, you are missing a lot.

It is, without doubt, one of the masterpieces of Mr. Villa-Lobos and the CD is fantastic.

Mrs. Sonia Rubinsky does a fantastic job. Playing is faultless and she feels, and enjoys the music. In few recordings you are able to "see" the face of the performer. This is one of them.

My favourite is Cirandas, but all are incredible.

Recording is excellent, and overall another hit for Naxos.

Go ahead, buy two, the friend who is going to ask it for a "loan" will not return it.

The playing here is rather weak and one has to wonder if being a native of a particular country can be a benefit or a hindrence? As for fantasy, which is much needed in the music of Villa Lobos, I don't feel there is much> The quality of this recording seems o.k. I heard a performance of this pianists RUDEPOEMA and was equally unimpressed! As for the composer? Villa lobos is Fantastic! Interestingly enogh, the pianist Deborah Halasz has embarked on a interesting complete Villa lobos piano music set thet outshines the other competitors, including the mundane playing of Marc Andre Hamelin