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Nabaza.net-The MarketPlace - Bartok: The Piano Concertos
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List Price: $16.98
Our Price: $16.98
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Deutsche Grammophon
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Audio CD
EAN: 0028947753308
Label: Deutsche Grammophon
Manufacturer: Deutsche Grammophon
Number Of Discs: 1
Publisher: Deutsche Grammophon
Release Date: 2005-01-11
Studio: Deutsche Grammophon
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Editorial Reviews:
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Pierre Boulez, always a sympathetic conductor of Bartók’s music, here leads three different orchestras and three different soloists in a highly recommendable disc of the composer's complete piano concertos. The First is a jagged, percussive piece reminiscent of Bartók's earlier Dance Suite in its driving rhythms. Like the Second Concerto's, the slow movement is one of his typically mysterious "night" pieces, with lightly tapping percussion accompanying the piano's ghostly entry and winds adding to the otherworldly effect in the central section. Soloist Krystian Zimerman plays it magnificently. The Second Concerto is no less challenging, but scored more transparently with Baroque-inspired counterpoint. Again, propulsive rhythms excite, and Leif Ove Andsnes sails through the virtuosic solo part with aplomb. Bartók wrote the first two to feature on his concert tours. The Third Concerto was written by the dying composer in 1945 as a legacy for his wife, a concert pianist. It's one of his most lyrical, relaxed works with long-lined melodies and often lush scoring. Here the pianist is Hélène Grimaud, playing with tonal beauty, poetic flair, and the requisite toughness for the final Allegro. With its superb soloists and orchestras and Boulez's consistency, this disc is a Bartókian feast. --Dan Davis
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Bartok's first two concertos are some of the most fun piano music around
Comment: Why Bela Bartok's first two piano concertos have not entered the standard repertoire I'll never know. These, written in 1926 and 1930-31, are some of the most exhilirating pieces of music around. In both, he emphasizes more the percussive side of the piano, beating out supremely engaging dance rhythms interspersed with brief pensive moments. The scoring is novel, as the first concerto mainly eschews strings, preferring more percussion and winds, while in the second concerto the strings only enter in the second movement. The two concertos complete each other well, with one being dark and brooding, and the other bouncy and sunny. They are a lovely synthesis of modernist vision and Eastern Europe folk music vitality.
As he lay dying in 1945, Bartok wrote the Piano Concerto No. 3 for his pianist wife Ditta Pasztory so that she might have a further source of income after his death. The result has always been problematic, for even passionate fans of the composer think he got a little too bland here. There's none of the dance rhythms and extended tonality that Bartok learnt from folk traditions. The form is pretty neoclassical, lacking Bartok's customary weird but oddly attractive ways of structuring his works.
So far, I've heard only this Boulez recording on DG and the Salonen reading of these concertos on Sony. I like how the DG uses for each concerto different pianists (Zimmerman, Andsnes, and Grimaud) and different orchestras (Chicago, Berlin and the London Symphony), which helps better bring out their distinct characters. I would strongly object to any notion that Boulez leaves the "passion" out of the music as with Bartok's writing, as even a simple literal reading of the score makes for lots of fun.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Disappointment from Boulez
Comment: Boulez is supposedly a great composer/conductor. What does this mean? Does this mean he hits all the notes right? I happen to believe there is more to music than this, so his hyper-active, same-dynamic-level rendering of Bartok's Piano Concertos, particularly the famous *Second* was a great disappointment. There is little music here, despite the technical mastery. Passages that I remember gloriously from other recordings in the past sound as though they were recreated by a huge machine, and not even a MIDI computer, which now does a much better job. I don't like dissing composers and musicians, so I will stop here, but I went on and right away purchased Esa-Pekka Solonen's versions of the concertos (also available on Amazon). These performances were *so much* better. Joseph Pehrson
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Summary: Tremendous tremendous performances
Comment: Even today Bartok remains a controversial composer, but these latest performances of three of his most seminal and exhilarating works must surely convince any doubters. The unifying link in the three, with different orchestras and different soloists is Pierre Boulez and he must take great credit for having brought out the individual character of these three fine works to the full. He is a master of precision and skill and has produced three superlative performances in very different circumstances.
My favorite of the three has to be the Second, widely regarded as a Bartok's finest Concerto. For the soloist this is not so much a test of technique as of physical force and endurance with its page after page of "doubled" writing. Leif Ove Andsnes meets the challenge perfectly and this is one of the most dazzling performances of any piece of music on record I have ever heard by both soloist and orchestra (Berlin Philharmonic). But the second is not just merely virtuosity and I would like you to hear the inner movements of this challenging piece especially carefully. This a piece of music you can listen to again and again. It will always leave you behind, but never give up the chase.
The third Concerto requires a somewhat different approach and I note that Boulez chose to record this with Helène Grimaud rather than one of the more flamboyant male soloists. Bartok wrote this piece specifically for his wife, Ditta Pasztory, and it is altogether a softer, more tender piece. The 'night music" slow movement is wonderfully done and I can't imagine this lovely and underrated piece ( whatever nasty cynic said he had composed this merely for cash?) ever being better performed.
The first concerto is a relatively early work and full of boyish energy indeed violence. Although musically it's probably the baby of the three, Krystian Zimmerman and the LSO give it "full welly" and it's a very engaging result. Altogether- strongly recommended.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Bartok: The Piano Concertos, Pierre Boulez
Comment: Sheer perfection, intense, fantastic interpretations. A must for serious record collectors.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Interesting, Good, and Clean
Comment: The Interesting: Boulez brings out some of the more conventional harmonies of the First Concerto! and some of the modernisms of the Third! (is that a substituted bass drum stroke at the end of the third movement?) - - And a different soloist and orchestra for each concerto -
The Good: The concertos come off reasonably well (with reservations).
The Clean: The recordings bring out a lot of detail found in the scores (especially the Bachian counterpoint of the Second Concerto).
My personal feelings: Zimerman never seems to be totally in sinc with Boulez in the First Concerto, especially in the outer movements - Not that they're 'not' together; just a 'oneness' that seems to be missing - I feel the pianist making an effort to bond with the conductor and orchestra (did they get together just to make a recording? or did they perform this work and then record it? - I don't know) - But I think this is the best rendition of the three -
The Second Concerto is very exciting - that scale and trill at the very opening, the accelerando at the end of the first movement - the scale was fine, but the trill is competing dynamically with brass (recording levels?) - the accelerando at the end of the first movment didn't feel like one, either - - The beginning and end of the second movement is way too fast for my taste - The string sound (absent from the first movement) and rhythmic stasis should fascinate after the energetic first movement - it didn't - The middle section was appropriately fast, but not frenzied enough - - The third movement, a variation of the first, felt fore-shortened - maybe it was the juxtapositions of tempi (tricky in Bartok) that made it seem wanting - Leif Ove Andsnes' playing is exemplary throughout (the 2nd movement 'esp./pesante' a highlight)-
The Third Concerto is a bit of a disappointment. The first movement is beautiful - the end especially (it literally evaporates) - - But the second is too slow - And some of the improvisational qualties in the piano part after the middle section seemed very mannered to me - There's a natural flow missing - - The last movement lacks urgency - I don't know if this is the fault of Grimaud or Boulez.
An interesting disc. Technically superior. Musically variable.
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