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Fusions

Nikolay Medvedev, piano (SOMM)

This aptly-named new release from Russian-born pianist Nikolay Medvedev brings together the music of George Gershwin and Nikolai Kapustin – two diverse pianist-composers who share the influence of jazz in their work – while also highlighting the virtuosity of Earl Wild, one of the greatest American pianists of the 20th century.

Nikolai Kapustin, born in 1937, the year Gershwin died, occupies a distinctive place in 20th- and 21st-century music. A classically trained pianist and composer, Kapustin cleverly fused the formal, structural rigour of classical music with the rhythmic vitality and improvisational idioms of jazz. His works defy categorisation: though they sound spontaneously jazzy, they are entirely notated in classical form, leaving no space for actual improvisation. This paradox became the hallmark of his style, and his music comprises the bulk of this new release.

Kapustin studied piano at the Moscow Conservatory at a time when jazz was still viewed with suspicion by the Soviet authorities. His fascination with American jazz pianists like Art Tatum, Oscar Peterson, and Erroll Garner led him to explore the genre in secret, and he absorbed its harmonic language, rhythmic energy, and phrasing to develop his own compositional language. His music – vibrant, cerebral, witty, exuberant and alive – was not internationally known in the early 2000s.

His second piano sonata, which opens this recording, was written in 1989, the year the USSR’s final collapse became increasingly apparent. Yet despite the turmoil in his homeland, the piano sonata is optimistic in mood – bright, spontaneous and rich in momentum and intriguing twists and turns.

Gershwin’s Three Preludes follow, written in the years after the instant success of his Rhapsody in Blue. Now, Gershwin found himself on the brink of realising his dream of being both a composer of popular and serious concert-hall music, and these three pieces reflect his ability to fuse classical forms with the rhythms and harmonies of American jazz. The first is an exercise in energetic syncopation; the second, lyrical, bluesy, and somewhat melancholy; while the third glitters with rugged rhythms and toe-tapping syncopations. Modest in scale, the preludes nonetheless reveal remarkable originality, blending blues idioms, syncopation, and chromatic colour within tightly structured miniatures.

The Concert Etudes are probably Kapustin’s best-known pieces, each with a distinct character – ebullient, impressionistic, groovy, funky. Despite the obvious jazz idioms, these pieces display an almost Lisztian classical sophistication and bravura in their harmonic and rhythmic language, and in their sparkling pianistic figurations (Kapustin composed at the keyboard to ensure that his music would fit the hand well). The second is redolent of another Russian composer – Sergei Rachmaninoff – while No. 6, Pastorale, has a jaunty Ragtime vibe, with a stride accompaniment.

American pianist Earl Wild (1915-2010) was a legendary virtuoso performer and renowned transcriber, bringing flamboyant brilliance to his arrangements, nowhere more evident than in his transcriptions of George Gershwin’s songs. These are not simple arrangements but rather imaginative re-compositions – richly textured pianistic fantasies filled with sweeping arpeggios, glittering passagework, and perfumed harmonies. In these dazzling concert pieces, Wild pays homage to Gershwin’s jazz-inflected originals, revealing their harmonic ingenuity and expressive depth, and to the great Romantic piano tradition of Franz Liszt and Sergei Rachmaninoff.

Nikolay Medvedev is the ideal advocate for this music, combining bravura flair and technical brilliance with a sensitivity to the repertoire and its shifting moods and colours. In Kapustin’s works, he pairs razor-sharp rhythmic control with an improvisatory sense of freedom and spontaneity, capturing the music’s brilliance and wit. In Gershwin’s Three Preludes, he balances jazz swagger with elegance, while in the Wild transcriptions, he transports us to the concert hall, relishing the theatricality and virtuosity of these pieces. Throughout the recording, the piano sound is bright and colourful, never harsh. There are moments when we might be listening in a late-night jazz club; at other times, in the opulent grandeur of Carnegie Hall.

The album offers a clear sense of continuity between composers often placed in separate musical worlds: the selection and order of the repertoire demonstrates how Gershwin’s jazz-inspired modernism paved the way for Kapustin’s sophisticated hybrid musical language, while Wild’s dazzling arrangements bridge popular song and concert virtuosity. This is a recording of brilliance and charm, played with poise, colour, and an infectious sense of enjoyment on the part of the pianist.

Fusions is released on the SOMM label.

(This review first appeared on the InterludeHK site)

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24 Preludes for Piano by Nicholas Scott-Burt

Da-Hee Kim piano

Premiere recording

Listen to the opening measures of the sixth Prelude from Nicholas Scott-Burt’s 24 Preludes for Piano, and you might be forgiven for thinking this is actually by J S Bach, with its combination of rigour and elegance, counterpoint and Baroque flourishes.

The ghost of Bach is also present in the very first Prelude of the set, redolent of the C major Prelude from Book 1 of the WTC in its processional momentum, its rhythm, and expression. Played by pianist Da-Hee Kim with a luminous glow and clear articulation, it’s a wonderful opening to this intriguing new release of contemporary piano music, drawing you into a composer’s soundworld that is richly coloured, texturally diverse, witty, and at times quite beautiful. 

British composer Nicholas Scott-Burt composed his 24 Preludes during 2019 and 2020. Following a tradition established by J S Bach and continued by, among others, Chopin, Debussy, and Shostakovich, Scott-Burt’s cycle reimagines the prelude as both a brief musical statement and a means for expressive variety. Each piece acts as a standalone miniature whilst also contributing to the overall narrative of the complete set: the Preludes are organised into four ‘Books’, which can be performed as an integrated sequence, ‘pausing for longer at the end of each book, as one might pause between the movements of a sonata or symphony’ (Nicholas Scott-Burt).

Each book has its own distinct character: Book 1 is neat and neo-classical; Book 2 is more extravagant and romantic; Book 3 is somewhat more introspective; and Book 4 is bright and sunny, though not without some darker moments.

The composer was kind enough to allow me to see the score, and it’s clear that he draws on a wide range of pianistic textures, rhythmic gestures, and harmonic languages in his writing. Some preludes evoke lyrical introspection, others have driving rhythmic energy or contrapuntal interplay. There’s a powerful array of dynamics from hushed delicacy to declamatory chords, and many of the preludes experiment with colouristic sonorities that brilliantly celebrate the piano’s resonance, sonic variety and expressive range. 

With their imaginative harmonic progressions, rhythmic variety and shifting tonal perspectives, each prelude embodies its own character and atmosphere. The result is a sequence that invites both performer and listener to explore a wide range of moods – from reflective calm to virtuosic brilliance – within the intimate scope of the piano miniature.

While rooted in the tradition of the prelude cycle, Scott-Burt’s collection has a distinctly modern voice, with his musical influences clearly evident. It echoes composers such as Bach, Chopin, Shostakovich, as well as Handel, Purcell, Schumann, Liszt, Prokofiev, Bartók, Messiaen, and jazz. Scott-Burt skillfully integrates all the colours of his own compositional language to craft music that is individual and contemporary, while acknowledging the rich traditions from which it emerges.

Award-winning Korean pianist Da-Hee Kim performs the preludes on this premiere recording, bringing both sensitivity and virtuosity to the music, always alert to its shifting colours and textures. She delivers pristine articulation, supple phrasing, some impressive pedal technique, a luminosity of tone, and wonderfully weightless playing, when required, highlighting the individual character of each prelude, and ‘musical personality’ of each Book.

Da-Hee Kim, pianist
Nicholas Scott-Burt

In addition to the 24 Preludes for Piano, this album includes two further works by Scott-Burt, his Minimalis I, ‘a self-imposed experimental exercise in structuring’, and Love Song, a contemporary on the tradition of the piano ‘Love Song’ by composers such as Mendelssohn, Schubert, Schumann, and Liszt.

This is a wonderful addition to the contemporary piano literature, and I truly hope the composer can find a publisher for his 24 Preludes, so that more pianists, both professional and amateur, can explore and enjoy it. 

24 Preludes for Piano is released on the Divine Art label on CD and streaming.

Read Meet the Artist interviews with Da-Hee Kim and Nicholas Scott-Burt

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Schubert: Impromptus Opp.90 and 142 – Eric Lu, piano (Warner Classics)

The two sets of Impromptus are my favourite piano pieces by Franz Schubert, music which I’ve explored as both player and listener since my teens. As a consequence, I’m very fussy about performances and interpretations of this music

In his second recording of Schubert’s piano music, Eric Lu, winner of both the Leeds and Chopin competitions, presents both sets of Impromptus. In interviews, Lu has expressed his affinity with and affection for Schubert’s music, stating that, “It is difficult to describe how meaningful his music is to me….he is the composer who moves me most intensely.“

A shame then, that Lu doesn’t seem to translate these statements when he actually plays the music. Ponderous tempos, lingering rubato and over-emphasised agogic accents, all presumblay intended to suggest “emotional depth” abound, particularly in the D898/1, D935/1 and D935/2. Here, I feel Lu mistakes slowness for profound emotion. This is most evident in the very first impromptu. That bare G that opens the piece is sustained far too long, to the point where one wonders if the pianist has perhaps forgotten what comes next. The opening theme is sluggish (the overall tempo is too slow here) and detracts from the drama and contrasting moods (portrayed in Schubert’s characteristic volte-faces between minor and major keys). I felt this performance was contrived, somewhat egocentric – and find myself repeating some of what I said about Lu’s previous Schubert release. Oh dear! (https://crosseyedpianist.com/2022/12/30/leeds-winners-release-albums/)

He’s better in the more lively impromptus. The D899/2 ripples along in its outer sections, with a clear dance pulse in the bass which adds to the sense of forward propulsion. The final impromptu, a fiery Hungarian dance, has rhythmic bite which contrasts with sparkling scalic passages.

Lu is often described as “a poet of the piano” (a moniker attributed to many a young competition winner these days!) and there’s no doubting his ability to make a beautiful sound, perhaps most evident on this recording in the G-flat major impromptu where Lu achieves a singing melodic line, sensitively phrased, over a subtly shifting bass of almost continuous movement.

The thing about this music is that Schubert gives plenty of directions and a rather more “literal” interpretation, free of wandering rubato and unnecessary accents, actually feels more in keeping with the composer’s emotional landscape.
And for that I would recommend recordings by more mature, experienced Schubert players such as Maria Joao Pires, Mitsuko Uchida or Murray Perahia.

But Lu is not yet 30 and there’s plenty of time for him to absorb all the subtleties and details of Schubert’s writing. So maybe I’ll find more to love in his next release, when it comes….

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Opus 109 – Vikingur Olafsson

A late masterpiece by Beethoven lies at the heart of this new release by Icelandic pianist Vikingur Olafsson to create a dialogue across the centuries.

The works of Beethoven’s third creative period feel both intimate and cosmic. It is the music of the future, yet it is fuelled by the music of the past – the music of Bach.

Vikingur Olafsson

Olafsson eschews the usual custom of presenting Beethoven’s final three sonatas together and instead places the transcendent Opus 109 alongside pieces by J S Bach and Franz Schubert as well as Beethoven’s Sonata Ppus 90 to create a ‘concept album’ where pieces connect and reflect.

For Olafsson, it was Bach’s Goldberg Variations (which he recorded in 2023) that drew him to Beethoven’s last three sonatas. He “felt the presence” of Bach in these late masterpieces, works where Bach’s influence is most strongly felt in their “wild polyphony”. The Sonata Opus 90, meanwhile, offers a prelude to the Opus 109 with its intimate, fleeting first movement and warm second movement, while also looking forward to Schubert’s early period sonata in E minor, D566, also scored in two movements. The other works on the album are Bach’s prelude in E major from the Well-Tempered Clavier and the imposing E minor Partita, perhaps the greatest of his keyboard suites.

Another unifying thread through the album is that all the pieces are in the key of E (major and minor modes) which for Ólafsson, who has a form of synaesthesia, represents lush and vibrant shades of green.

The album opens with the Prelude No. 9 in E from Book 1 of the Well-Tempered Clavier, played with Olafsson’s trademark luminous tone. It’s an intimate opener and contrasts with the drama of Beethoven’s Sonata No. 27, the first movement of which is imposing yet carries with it, especially in the second movement, the same airy elegance of the Bach Prelude.

The E minor Partita is serious, majestic, articulated with clean Baroque detachment and sensitive voicing. Olafsson finds the same intimacy in the middle movements of the Partita, in particular in the Allemande, which is almost tender in its counterpoint. The Sarabande, prayer-like and sombre, has an improvisatory quality. The closing Gigue, meanwhile, is energetic and crisply articulated.

We stay with E minor in Schubert’s two-movement Sonata D566. Olfasson’s transparent sound and subtle phrasing suit Schubert and he brings a warm cantabile to the music, in particular in the second movement.

With his characteristic clarity, poetic imagination and instinct for colour, Ólafsson approaches Beethoven’s late-period masterwork as a living, breathing meditation – fragile, searching, ultimately transcendent. The opening movement is natural, almost spontaneous, with a conversational quality in its phrasing.

The middle movement bursts forth with a controlled ferocity. Here, Ólafsson’s articulation is exceptionally clean, almost crystalline, but never merely virtuosic.

The emotional heart of this sonata is the third movement, with its tender, prayerful theme. Each variation has its own emotional landscape, shaped with meticulous attention to detail and rich in genuine feeling, yet Olafsson never loses sight of the overall narrative arc of this movement. His voicing allows inner lines to glow while the delicate filigree in the upper registers shimmers delicately. The music seems to unfold in a single, unbroken breath, time almost suspended in the later variations. Here is the music’s spiritual core and Olfasson invites us to bask in its radiance.

The album closes with the Sarabande from the E major French Suite, as Olafssons takes us back to the beginning, as it were, with J S Bach, the daddy of them all.

As with his previous releases, notably his recordings ‘Rameau and Debussy’ and ‘From Afar’, Olfasson brings a fresh perspective to well-known repertoire through thoughtful programming, finding intriguing connections and shining a new light on the familiar. And it’s all beautifully presented too.

Opus 109 is released on Deutsche Grammophon on CD and streaming