Nikolai Lugansky plays Liszt
Nikolai Lugansky (piano)
Lugansky's exceptional command of tremolo figuration really does have Liszt's keyboard figuration shimmering as it should.
Nikolai Lugansky plays Liszt
Nikolai Lugansky (piano)
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Lugansky's exceptional command of tremolo figuration really does have Liszt's keyboard figuration shimmering as it should.
About
The great Russian virtuoso Nikolai Lugansky presents his recording to mark the 200th anniversary of the birth of Franz Liszt (1811-1886) – an album of popular piano pieces including La Campanella, Valse oubliée, his version of Isolde’s Liebestod by Wagner, some of the Douze études d’exécution transcendante, and several gems from Années de pèlerinage, among them Vallée d’Obermann, Sposalizio, Les jeux d’eau de la Villa d’Este and Sonnet de Pétrarque 123.
An acclaimed recording artist, Nikolai Lugansky has recently signed an exclusive contract with the Naïve-Ambroisie label. The Moscow-born pianist put together this disc, his first devoted entirely to Liszt’s music, with a seriousness, freedom and concern for overall unity worthy of the composer himself. His last release - an all-Chopin recital for Onyx - was described by The Guardian as “unquestionably thrilling”, and his recording with violinist Repin of Sonatas by Franck, Grieg and Janáček (Deutsche Grammophon, October 2010) was hailed by Gramophone as “a quite magnificent performance”. It also won the Prize for best Chamber Music recording at the BBC Music Magazine Awards 2011. Nikolai Lugansky won the Diapason d’Or for his recordings of the complete Chopin Études and Preludes, and the Rachmaninov Preludes and Moments musicaux, as well as an Echo Klassik Deutscher Musikpreis for his 2005 recording of Rachmaninov’s Piano Concertos Nos 1 & 3. Capable of great refinement and sensitivity in Mozart and Schumann, and breathtaking virtuosity in Rachmaninov and Prokofiev, Lugansky is a pianist of extraordinary depth and versatility. Recent and upcoming engagements include concerto projects with the Leipzig Gewandhaus and Andris Nelsons, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Vasily Petrenko, Philharmonia Orchestra and Esa-Pekka Salonen, and Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich and NHK Symphony Orchestra all with Charles Dutoit; recitals at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Moscow State Conservatory, London’s Wigmore Hall, Prague’s Rudolfinum and the Wiener Konzerthaus; and chamber music collaborations with Vadim Repin and Leonidas Kavakos.
Contents and tracklist
Awards and reviews
January 2012
Lugansky's exceptional command of tremolo figuration really does have Liszt's keyboard figuration shimmering as it should.
March 2012
Once you have settled to Lugansky's sometimes glossy tone, it is hard not to be seduced by the playing of a natural Lisztian, as alive to textual detail as conveying a work's drama and poetry. Look no further than his bravura handling of Vallee d'Oberman, surely on of the composer's most inspired masterpieces, rising to ecstatic heights in the final pages.
February 2012
Lugansky's approach is a musicianly, 'contained' and modern reaction to the worst excesses and extravagances of the past. Occasionally cool-headed to the point of detachment, he is clearly intent of celebrating Liszt as above all a great musician rather than a meretricious showman. You will not easily locate a more poetic view of three of the Transcendent Etudes
February 2012
The positioning of each piece maximises its unique qualities and expression, meanwhile fulfilling an intrinsic role in the overall succession of vivid impressions. Lugansky's immense palette of colour, dynamics and varities of touch are exploited to the fullest. Studiously avoiding and tendency to overplay, he creates instead thoughtful and poetic interpretations and textures that shimmer rather than dazzle.
10th November 2011
Lugansky is a fine – if occasionally cool – interpreter of [Liszt's] work, blending lyricism with panache and just the right sense of daring, so that you're often conscious of huge technical challenges braved, then overcome...Just occasionally – in the Liebestod, and in Petrarch Sonnet 123 – you wish he'd let rip a bit more...A flawed disc, though the best of it is an absolute knockout.
4th December 2011
Lugansky favours fantasy over whimsy. Liszt's ticklish arrangement of Paganini's "La Campanella" is the only rhinestone twinkler in a handsome programme. Throughout, there is a feeling of extemporisation, most clearly in the "Transcendent Etude in F minor".
