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BIS-CD-1413 Feinberg - Piano EAN 7318590014134
TT 70'13
Samuil Feinberg: Piano Sonata
No.1, Op.1; Piano Sonata No.2, Op.2 (1915-16); Piano Sonata No.3,
Op.3 (1916); Piano Sonata No.4, Op.6 (1918); Piano Sonata No.5,
Op.10 (1920-21); Piano Sonata No.6, Op.13 (1923)
Nikolaos Samaltanos, piano (Sonatas Nos.1, 4 &
5); Christophe Sirodeau, piano (Sonatas Nos.2, 3 & 6)
Samuil (Samuel) Evgenievitch Feinberg (1890-1962), who was born
in Odessa, will be a new name to many. And those who are familiar
with it are more likely to have come across him as a pianist
rather than as a composer. His recordings of piano music from
Bach to Scriabin belong to the history of pianism and are still
being reissued. Feinberg was certainly a remarkably gifted pianist
but he saw himself, above all, as a composer. The performers
on this disc - pianists Nikolaos Samaltanos and Christophe Sirodeau
who have already done so much to promote the music of Skalkottas
on BIS - argue that Feinberg's own music has been very unjustly
neglected, largely on account of the political conditions prevailing
in the Soviet Union during so much of his lifetime. In spite
of his eminence as a performer, Feinberg was basically confined
to the Soviet Union from the 1930s onwards and as his own compositions
did not correspond to the criteria of "socialist realism"
they were not much performed. Feinberg was an influential teacher
with a profound dislike of self-promotion. Contemporaries described
him as a "deeply visionary artist who was full of the abysses
and ambiguities of modern life" and his piano sonatas were
seen as "poems of life".
This disc is the first of two volumes devoted to the complete
piano sonatas of Samuel Feinberg. It contains the first six sonatas
written at various times between 1915 and 1923. Besides the committed
performances of the two pianists Nikolaos Samaltanos and Christophe
Sirodeau, the latter also contributes a substantial essay on
the composer and his neglected works. (Three of these important
sonatas have never been recorded before.) Another major "first"
from BIS.
For an enlightening and entertaining interview with BIS founding
director Robert von Bahr concerning the company's 30th anniversary,
recording ideals old and new, and the importance of being digital,
please visit the following link:
http://www.musicweb.uk.net/classrev/2003/Sept03/bahr.htm
BIS-CD-1414 Feinberg - Piano TT 79'40
Samuil Feinberg: Piano Sonata
No.7, Op.21; Piano Sonata No.8, Op.21a (1924-34); Piano Sonata
No.9, Op.29 (1939); Piano Sonata No.10, Op.30 (1940-43); Piano
Sonata No.11, Op.40 (1952); Piano Sonata No.12, Op.48 (1962)
Nikolaos Samaltanos, piano (Sonatas Nos.9, 10 &
11); Christophe Sirodeau, piano (Sonatas Nos.7, 8 & 12)
Im November letzten Jahres veröffentlichte BIS
die erste der zwei CDs, die den Sonaten von Feinberg gewidmet
sind. Diese CD enthält nun die letzten Sonaten, die zwischen
1924 und 1962 entstanden sind. Drei dieser Sonaten sind noch
nie vorher aufgenommen worden. Diese Edition zeigt Feinberg als
eine unverwechselbare Stimme; seine Klavierwerke sind fraglos
ein bedeutender Beitrag zu diesem Genre im 20. Jahrhundert.
REVIEWS
RECORDING OF THE MONTH
REVELATORY
The music of Samuil Evgenievitch Feinberg is hypnotic in the
extreme, most obviously close to Scriabin in mystical mode. All
credit to BIS (who already are doing sterling work for the composer
Nikos Skalkottas) for releasing this magnificent disc, with superbly
detailed annotations by Christophe Sirodeau, one of the two pianists
featured on the disc, and a composer himself. Both Sirodeau and
Samaltanos contributed to the Skalkottas/Feinberg concerts held
in Paris in 1999. Intriguing, also, to have two such fine pianists’
reactions to the same composer’s music. Rather than dwell
on any immediate differences, it seems truer to the spirit of
the disc to point out both artists’ obvious dedication to
and love of this music, two facets that result in this disc being
the special release it is. It is certainly on my short-list as
one of my ‘Discs of the Year’.
The shifting colours of the First Sonata are a fair
indication of this composer’s sound-world. Shifting colours
here both in the sense of Samaltanos’s keyboard touch, which
is magnificent in its scope, but also in the harmonic language
the composer uses. There is a lingering intensity about this
statement, as the harmonies move from Scriabinesque to Bergian.
The violent end of this short (6’50) Sonata comes as a surprise.
Although contemporaneous with the first Sonata, the Second (both
date from the year of Scriabin’s death) exhibits a wide
frame of reference. The booklet notes point us towards Medtner
and early Szymanowski. Similarly in one movement, it comes across
as a single flow of consciousness. The pianist here, Christophe
Sirodeau, realises the fairly unrelenting intensity while demonstrating
an approach generally softer than that of Samaltanos - more identifiably
Gallic, perhaps?
The Third Sonata, although it was composed in 1916,
had to wait until 1974 for publication! The Marcia funebre and
the fugato were reused in his Piano Concerto No. 1, Op. 20. Much
larger in size (three times as long as the First Sonata), it
speaks of extremities of utterance that, technically, pose no
problem to Sirodeau. Quasi-consonant harmonic arrival points
act as markers or as the notes would have it, ‘life-buoys’.
The prelude is dark, and harmonically advanced in the manner
of late Liszt, while the similarly dark chordings of the Marcia
Funebre make this experience hard work for both pianist and listener.
The third movement, curiously and confusingly, is also called
‘Sonata’. The reference point that kept on cropping
up was Steven Osborne’s excellent Hyperion disc of Kapustin
(CDA67159).
Feinberg dedicated his Fourth Sonata to Miaskovsky.
The impulsive, thrusting nature of the music is again reminiscent
of Scriabin, almost, at his most elusive. Samaltanos returns,
using a gentle touch now. In his booklet notes, Sirodeau refers
to Bulgakov’s magnificent novel The Master and Margarita,
with its unlikely parade of horror/comic ‘happenings’,
as a point of reference. It is easy to see what he is getting
at although Feinberg comes without the laughs. Feinberg’s
harmonic logic ensures a stream of free-flow washes from first
to last. For some reason, on each playing of the disc it was
at this point that I mentally remarked on the excellence of the
recording. Perhaps this one is just that bit superior to the
rest? The recording date for Sonatas 1-5 is merely given as ‘Spring
2002’.
Samaltanos is the featured pianist in the Fifth Sonata
of around 1920-21. At first it reminded me of Scriabin’s
Fourth Piano Sonata, where harmonic drug-hazed meanderings meet
elusive prestissimi. However Feinberg inhabits a world of his
own - the figure of Ravel simultaneously hovers over the opening.
The Allegro main section is relatively violent, featuring determined
arpeggios. It is magnificent, because of the surety of Feinberg’s
compositional hand; always, you are aware that the guiding voice
is that of a Master.
The Sixth Sonata is probably the finest work in the
present set. It takes in a world of references - the bell-like
tolling of the opening seems to recall Debussy’s ‘Cathédrale
engloutie’ (Préludes I); but Janácek and Schoenberg
both vie for attention, all sitting alongside a perceptive use
of the B-A-C-H motif. Some of the reiterated block chords (around
6’) even sound like gestures from early Stockhausen electronic
music! The performance (Sirodeau) is miraculous. It is here that
virtuosity reaches its peak.
The structure of the Sixth Sonata is determined by
its ideas - there is no recap as such, just a sense of continual
evolution. As Sirodeau writes, ‘the composer seems to find
himself on the tip of an apocalyptic sword ... and the listener
remains imprisoned by the spirit of confusion and even of irreparable
tragedy that dominates this work.’ Often dark and violent,
but also containing passages of Messiaen-like luminosity, this
is a tour de force, a piece that simply refuses to let the listener
go. The very close is typical in its thought-provoking way, leaving
the listener hanging in the air.
The present issue is not really one to listen to straight
through, not if you’re really listening - it would simply
be too tiring. Enjoy the Sonatas one at a time, and enjoy the
voyage of discovery.
Colin Clarke / MusicWeb 2004
------
Samuel Evgenievitch Feinberg was famous in his lifetime
as a
virtuoso pianist and respected teacher, and somewhat less as
a composer of
great imagination and skill. The piano sonatas presented on this
disc reveal
two stylistic sides of Feinberg: the elaborate, intensely chromatic
fantasist of Sonatas No. 7 and No. 8; and the more diatonic,
elegant
academic of the Sonatas No. 9-12. Listeners will be reminded
of Skryabin in
the first two works, for that composer's influence was strong
on Feinberg
until 1934. During the repressive Stalinist years and until his
death,
Feinberg either maintained silence or published more accessible
works that
passed party scrutiny. His later style, safely within conservative
Soviet
guidelines, was influenced by Prokofiev, but elements of Feinberg's
earlier
wildness still appear in his unpredictable modulations and ambiguous
tonality. Nikolaos Samaltanos and Christophe Sirodeau divide
the six sonatas
between them, and deliver them with equal levels of enthusiasm
and
sensitivity. Sonatas No. 7, No. 8, and No. 9 receive their world-premiere
recordings here, and the revelation of these exciting works is
an important
step in restoring Feinberg's reputation, long overdue. The recording
is
satisfactory, though it has a recital hall resonance that suggests
distant
microphone placement.
Blair Sanderson, All Music Guide 2004
------
Reference Recording - This one 10/10
Although Samuel Feinberg (1890-1962) is best known
today as one of the great Russian pianists of his (or any) generation,
his reputation as a composer has been neglected. He mainly concentrated
on vocal music and works for his own instrument, including 12
sonatas for piano solo. Having recorded the first six for BIS,
pianists Christophe Sirodeau and Nikolaos Samaltanos once again
split the labor for the rest (Samaltanos plays Nos. 9, 10, and
11; Sirodeau plays 7, 8, and 12). The influence of Scriabin's
later period decisively permeates Feinberg's style in its restless
keyboard textures and harmonic density, with hints of the Futurist
movement to come. If anything, Feinberg's piano writing often
sounds more complex, like Godowsky transcribing Scriabin, or
Szymanowski adding side comments.
The Seventh and Eighth sonatas, both three-movement
works, exploit the piano to the hilt, not just in the super-virtuosic
outer movements but also in the slow central movements' organ-like
sonorities. Sonatas 9, 10, and 11 return to the single, continuous-movement
form that Feinberg favored in earlier works and that Scriabin
perfected in his last five sonatas. Here, however, the musical
language has become more diatonic and superficially accessible
(think later Prokofiev), although the technical difficulties
hardly abate. Sirodeau and Samaltanos clearly believe in these
fascinating albeit uneven works and imbue them with all the dynamic
contrast, tonal variety, and technical finish they require. Even
the largest, most intractable, note-packed climaxes (such as
the Eighth sonata's concluding Allegro) are fully voiced and
never banged out. Sirodeau's booklet annotations discuss Feinberg's
music in thorough and refreshingly balanced detail, and the sonics
are ideal.
Jed Distler, ClassicToday.com 2004
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