Notes and Editorial Reviews
The world has no shortage of live recitals from Emil Gilels, but this outing from the 1972 Salzburg Festival is one of the best: His playing is in top form, the repertoire is both sexy and substantial, and the sound quality is as good you could hope for from this vintage. Though Gilels sometimes played Mozart like someone speaking a language phonetically, there's no lack of emotional or intellectual connection in the KV 533 sonata (with Rondo KV 494); the cascading runs are never played for their mere beauty. Brahms' Op. 116 Fantasies always were among Gilels' best successes, but these performances have a welcome delicacy and lightness (a breath-catching contrast to the weightier climaxes) not heard in his studio recording for Deutsche
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Grammophon. In the vividly characterized, knowingly-colored accounts of Debussy's Images I, Gilels gives the impression of inexhaustible power in reserve. The final treat--Stravinsky's Three Dances from Petrushka--suffers slightly from flagging tension, perhaps due to the piece's steep technical demands and the pianist's end-of-recital fatigue. But this selection alone will prompt some listeners to buy the disc, if only to hear this piano transcription played by a pianist with such prodigious coloristic gifts that no one is likely to miss the orchestra.
--David Patrick Stearns, ClassicsToday.com
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Works on This Recording
1.
Sonata for Piano no 15 in F major, K 533 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Performer:
Emil Gilels (Piano)
Period: Classical
Written: 1788; Vienna, Austria
Date of Recording: 08/17/1972
Venue: Live Salzburg, Austria
2.
Rondo for Piano no 2 in F major, K 494 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Performer:
Emil Gilels (Piano)
Period: Classical
Written: 1786; Vienna, Austria
Date of Recording: 08/17/1972
Venue: Live Salzburg, Austria
3.
Fantasies (7) for Piano, Op. 116 by Johannes Brahms
Performer:
Emil Gilels (Piano)
Period: Romantic
Written: 1892; Austria
Date of Recording: 08/17/1972
Venue: Live Salzburg, Austria
4.
Images for Piano, Set 1 by Claude Debussy
Performer:
Emil Gilels (Piano)
Period: 20th Century
Written: 1905; France
Date of Recording: 08/17/1972
Venue: Live Salzburg, Austria
5.
Pétrouchka: Three movements for Piano by Igor Stravinsky
Performer:
Emil Gilels (Piano)
Period: 20th Century
Written: 1921; France
Date of Recording: 08/17/1972
Venue: Live Salzburg, Austria
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