Sergei Rachmaninov; Sergei Prokofiev - Piano Concertos No. 3 (Van Cliburn)

Information

Composer: Sergei Rachmaninov; Sergei Prokofiev

• Rachmaninov - Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor, Op. 30
• Prokofiev - Piano Concerto No. 3 in C major, Op. 26

Van Cliburn, piano

Symphony of the Air / Kirill Kondrashin

Chicago Symphony Orchestra / Walter Hendl

Date: 1958; 1960

Label: RCA

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Review

Van Cliburn’s live 1958 Rachmaninov Third Concerto from Carnegie Hall makes its first appearance in RCA’s Living Stereo line. Its three-track incarnation gives a stronger sense of venue ambience over the boxy-sounding two-track mixdown most recently made available in Philips’ deleted Great Pianists line. Even so, unattractive aspects of John Pfeiffer’s closely miked production remain, such as unrealistically spotlit solo instruments. I also suspect that there was not much “after-the-fact” editing, given the tiny performance inaccuracies and ensemble glitches.

Cliburn’s patient, lyrical approach to the score provided a refreshing alternative to the fire-and-brimstone standard favored by pianists under Horowitz’s spell. At the same time, Cliburn’s huge hands most assuredly grasp the composer’s massive chords and serpentine textures. I’m not certain if this was the first commercial Rachmaninov Third recording to dispense with the composer’s “traditional” cuts (save for the tiny incision of a superfluous repeated figure in the first-movement cadenza), but it was the first to incorporate the heavier, chord-based first-movement cadenza that most pianists now favor (wrongly, to my mind).

Kyrill Kondrashin’s firm, steadfast conducting transcends the Symphony of the Air’s spottier aspects (the brass, for instance) in the Rachmaninov, but I wish Fritz Reiner’s Chicago Symphony Orchestra had been on hand. And I also wish that Cliburn’s Chicago recording of the Prokofiev Third had been led by Kondrashin. Compare his pointed, colorful support of Byron Janis on Mercury to the workaday professionalism with which Walter Hendl and the Chicagoans support–yet hardly inspire–Cliburn, and you’ll hear why I consider this performance very good but not in the class of Janis/Kondrashin, Katchen/Kertesz, Graffman/Szell, and Argerich/Abbado. Sonically speaking, of course, its present three-track incarnation is beyond cavil.

-- Jed Distler

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Sergei Rachmaninov (1 April [O.S. 20 March] 1873 – 28 March 1943) was a Russian composer, virtuoso pianist, and conductor. He is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music. His music was influenced by Tchaikovsky, Arensky and Taneyev. Rachmaninov wrote five works for piano and orchestra: four concertos and the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. He also composed a number of works for orchestra alone, including three symphonies, the Symphonic Dances Op. 45, and four symphonic poems.

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Sergei Prokofiev (27 April [O.S. 15 April] 1891 – 5 March 1953) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century. He studied at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory where his teachers included Anatoly Lyadov and Nikolai Tcherepnin. His works include such widely heard pieces as Lieutenant Kijé, Romeo and Juliet, Peter and the Wolf, as well as seven completed operas, seven symphonies, eight ballets, five piano concertos, two violin concertos, a cello concerto, a symphony-concerto for cello and orchestra, and nine completed piano sonatas.

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Van Cliburn (July 12, 1934 – February 27, 2013) was an American pianist. He studied the Juilliard School in New York under Rosina Lhévinne, who trained him in the tradition of the great Russian romantics. In 1958, at the age of 23, Cliburn achieved worldwide recognition when he won the inaugural International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow during the Cold War. Upon returning to the United States, he signed for RCA Victor and performed and recorded through the 1970s. Cliburn played for royalty and heads of state from dozens of countries and for every U.S. president from 1958 until his death.

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