 |
|
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Franz Liszt, Béla Bartók |
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791) Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra in E flat major KV 365 (1779) 26:46
Franz Liszt (1811–1886) [04] Concerto Pathétique for two pianos, S 258 (1856) 19:19
Béla Bartók (1882–1945) Concerto for Two Pianos, Percussion and Orchestra (1940) 26:32 total time 72:58
Hörproben und Download: MOZART – LISZT – BARTÓK The three pieces on this CD were composed by virtuoso pianist composers for their pianists on the distaff side: for a sister, a pupil, or a wife. In terms of their own abilities, these women were, quite obviously, emancipated – based at least on the pianistic degree of difficulty the pieces evince. It seems their authors did not have the weaker sex in mind. In 1922 the 19-year-old Ditta Pásztory entered Béla Bartók’s piano class at the Buda-pest Music Academy, marrying her professor in 1923. In 1924 their son Peter came into the world. For 15 long years she played only in private, making her public debut at the age of 35, in Basel, with Bartók’s Sonata for two pianos and percussion. Bartók was an excellent pianist, who had dared perform Beethoven’s Fifth Piano Concerto and his own arrangement of Richard Strauss’ Heldenleben on stage. He is said to have played Liszt’s Totentanz and Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue brilliantly. He wanted to make possible a late career for his wife; this was certainly also seen from the aspect of their common uncertain future: in spring 1938 Bartók decided to move “far away from a plagued country”, Nazi Germany, leaving Europe for the USA. As a married couple, they extended with great purpose the four-hand, two-piano repertoire, a prime example being the reworking of the E flat major Concerto that Mozart had composed in 1779 for himself and his sister Nannerl. Two performances of the concerto with the married couple Bartók-Pásztory entered the annals, the first on 27 February 1939 in Paris (conductor: Hermann Scherchen), the second on 8 October 1940 in Budapest, with a final farewell concert (conductor: Janos Ferencsik). Some attention arose from the circumstance that the cadenzas in the first and third movements are those of Bartók himself. To a Mozart connoisseur this might appear strange, but he or she will realize that the composer’s own cadenzas are still extant. It should be remembered that only towards the end of 1937 were the new ones published, and it is probable that Bartók had no knowledge of this. That is as it may be, and the cadences he wrote are only decipherable with difficulty; at times they are quite ambivalent. Up until recently they were gathering dust in Florida in the archives of the son Peter Bartók. Their most astonishing characteristic: the pianists cancel as it were at short notice their so well-defined role as partners in dialogue with Mozart: the cadenza of the first movement is only in piano I, and that of the third movement is entrusted to just piano II. Both Mozartian commentaries by Bartók are rather bulky – something one might have expected – and are neither smooth nor brilliant. The first cadenza takes us with the help of stormy diminished seventh chords into the particularly remote key of F sharp major, whose fundamental is held for a dozen bars as (a slightly uncomfortable) inner pedal, over and under which the first theme is elaborated. The second theme is arrived at by means of a developmental motif; the main theme is led along a narrow path with its disconcerting chromaticism; the cadenza is brought to a head with virtuosic parallel thirds and double trills. The cadenza of the finale-rondo concerns itself first with the refrain theme, reworks in fantastic manner the D flat major and G flat major areas of the first couplet and, via triplets in both hands, finds its way back to Mozart. Both cadenzas are, by the way, twice as long as Mozart’s. In 1858 an 18-year old piano novice travelled to Weimar to see Franz Liszt and caused much attention there: she was blonde, beautiful, had mastered five languages, played sport, wrote very serious fugues and was already a virtuoso. She was called Ingeborg Starck, a young Swedish woman who had grown up in St. Petersburg. For his part, Liszt soon cast on her a well-meaning eye – that of a pedagogue so to speak. He allowed her to perform at his matinee concerts on the Altenburg, played with her pieces for four-hands or at two pianos. He also reworked a “large-scale concerto solo”, a competition piece for the Paris Conservatoire, for two pianos, dedicating it to his pupil in great “admiration”. The married couple Bartók-Pásztory probably had the piece in their repertoire, Bartók at least knew it well, and many years earlier had made a phonograph recording together with Ernst von Dohnányi. His preference for Liszt had a strongly patriotic aspect, as he had once been President of the Budapest Music Academy and Bartók had been his musical grandchild. But Bartók also discovered Liszt’s progressiveness for himself, at a time when the general view of his music was very low and audiences were not yet able to comprehend the bold late works. What provoked Bartók at the end of his E minor Concerto was certainly not the pathos announced in the title as much as the close proximity to the famous B minor Sonata. This remains valid for thematic similarities, but in terms of form too, which Bartók found plausible and particularly impressing: three movements revolving around just two themes, albeit ones which are particularly capable of being transformed. In 1937, Paul Sacher, the rich Swiss patron and conductor, commissioned Bartók to write the second of what were to be three works financed by his millions. What emerged was the Sonata for two pianos and two percussionists, one of the most thorough-going and practical applications of Bartók’s folklore studies, and a fascinating combination of constructional intellect and elements of that “driving” Balkan folk music, which Bartók only ever called “farmers’ music”. The piece may have been in the mind’s eye of Thomas Mann or his musical ghost-writer Adorno when they described the imaginary and major work of a certain Adrian Leverkühn, alias Dr. Faustus, as “sounds, which like bare noise, begin as magical and fantastical drumming and the beating of gongs but which soar ever upwards into pure music”. Bartók’s extension of the Sonata to a “Concerto” took place in 1940 at suggestion of his publisher Heinsheimer, who attempted at the same time to act as an agent for the couple. The parts for the four soloists, which are to take the same stage positions as in the original version, were only changed slightly by Bartók, the musical substance and overall length of the piece remaining the same. The New York performance in January 1943 under the direction of his compatriot Fritz Reiner marked Bartók’s final public appearance as a pianist. Rainer Peters BERLINER PHILHARMONIKER
Concerti I Vorgestellt von Margarete Zander Der Erfolg mit dem Konzert für zwei Klaviere und Orchester in Es-Dur hat die Pianisten Andreas Grau und Götz Schumacher vor 20 Jahren darin bestätigt, als Duo zusammen zu bleiben. Es ist ihr Stück geworden und das spürt man an der Selbstverständlichkeit der Dialoge miteinander und mit dem Orchester. Das Klavierduo hatte den armenischen Geiger als Leiter des Württembergischen Kammerorchesters Heilbronn kennengelernt: "Seine Qualität ist seine Energie", lautet ihr Urteil über ihn. Fasziniert habe sie, "dass er nicht versucht, solch einen Apparat in Bewegung zu bringen, sondern dass er selbst Teil dieses Ensembles wird." Vertraut mit ungarischen Akzenten Von Béla Bartók stammen in diesem Fall die beiden Kadenzen des Mozartschen Konzertes, sie sind jeweils für einen Pianisten solo geschrieben: "Und es sind ja wirklich Welten, die gehen über Beethoven bis hin zu Debussy. Was da für Klangräume erschlossen werden!" Ein virtuoser Pianist war Bartók. Sein Konzert für zwei Klaviere, Schlagzeug und Orchester - eines der ganz großen Werke des 20. Jahrhunderts - beruht auf einer Sonate für zwei Pianisten und zwei Schlagzeuger. Durch die persönliche Zusammenarbeit mit ungarischen Komponisten unserer Zeit wie Eötvös und Kurtag sind dem Klavierduo GrauSchumacher die ungarischen Akzente bis in feinste Klangfärbungen vertraut. Und wenn Bartók von ihnen perkussives Spiel verlangt und von den Schlagzeugern die Melodieführung, dann können sie sich begeistern, dass sie die beiden Schlagzeuger der Berliner Philharmoniker Franz Schindlbeck und Jan Schlichte als Partner gewinnen konnten. Es zählt nur das intensive Miteinander Musikalisch haben die vier Musiker ihre Parts intim ineinander verwoben, rein aufnahmetechnisch ist das an einigen Stellen leider leicht unausgewogen abgemischt. Auch in Liszt "Concerto Pathétique" für zwei Klaviere stimmt die Balance nicht, aber das rein kompositionstechnisch: Während der Komponist den virtuosen Part übernahm, gab er seiner Schülerin eine weniger spektakuläre Rolle. Doch für ein Klavierduo wie GrauSchumacher zählt nur das intensive Miteinander. Sie sind überzeugt: "Dass einer strahlend die Bühne verlässt und der andere nicht, das geht nicht. Dann war das einfach keine gute Duoleistung." Feines Gespür für Farben und Dynamik Dieses ist eine überzeugende Duoleistung. Die Pianisten zeigen ein feines Gespür für Farben und Dynamik und nutzen das, was zu Liszts Zeiten für die Zuhörer unbekannt und daher besonders aufregend war, um im romantischen Charakter des Werkes geschickt die energietreibenden Impulse zu finden. |
|
