Alexander Scriabin - Piano Sonatas Nos. 2, 5 & 9; etc. (Yevgeny Sudbin)

Information

Composer: Alexander Scriabin

1. Étude, Op. 8 No. 12
2. Sonata No. 2 (Sonate-Fantaisie), Op. 19: I. Andante
3. Sonata No. 2 (Sonate-Fantaisie), Op. 19: II. Presto
4. Étude from Three Pieces, Op. 2
5. Ten Mazurkas, Op. 3: No. 3. Allegretto
6. Ten Mazurkas, Op. 3: No. 6. Scherzando
7. Ten Mazurkas, Op. 3: No. 1. Tempo giusto
8. Ten Mazurkas, Op. 3: No. 4. Moderato
9. Sonata No. 5, Op. 53
10. Nuances from Four Pieces, Op. 56
11. Poème from Two Pieces, Op. 59
12. Sonata No. 9, 'Messe noire', Op. 68
13. Valse, Op. 38

Yevgeny Sudbin, piano

Date: 2007

Label: BIS

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Review

Writing in prose as delirious as his playing, Yevgeny Sudbin speaks in his accompanying nine-page essay of the incomprehension that greeted Scriabin’s half-crazed genius in both Russia and the West. I should add that America, too, was similarly baffled, reminding us that there are those who think “that the air is filled with green monkeys with crimson eyes and sparkling tails, a kind of ecstasy that is sold in Russia at two roubles a bottle”. This is entirely apt and, laying my cards firmly on the table, I should say that no pianist of any generation has, in my experience, captured Scriabin’s volatility so vividly as Sudbin.

In his choice of sonatas (ranging through Scriabin’s early, middle and late periods), his mix of drama and introspection are positively alchemic and entirely his own. It is as if the music’s very nerve ends are exposed to view and rarely have I heard a pianist prepared to take such risks on record. He takes virtuosity to the very edge at the end of the Fifth Sonata and his daredevil aplomb is at its height in the Ninth, suitably named Black Mass Sonata.

How he varies the colour, light and shade in the early D sharp minor Etude so that its familiar heroic octaves sound newly minted and never merely frenetic! His selection of Mazurkas is given with a breathtaking subtlety, making you long to hear him in Chopin, while his response to Scriabin’s command in the Fifth Sonata, presto tumultuoso esaltato, is like the vortex of a whirlwind.

All these performances are flecked with personal touches and brilliances above and beyond even Scriabin’s wildest demands.Finally, BIS captures Sudbin’s astonishing range of colours and sonorities, ranging from the utmost delicacy to an enraged uproar, in crystalline demonstration sound. This, put suitably euphorically, is a disc in a million.

-- Bryce Morrison

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Alexander Scriabin (6 January 1872 – 27 April 1915) was a Russian composer and pianist, renowned for his innovative contributions to classical music. He studied at the Moscow Conservatory under Anton Arensky, Sergei Taneyev and Vasily Safonov. Scriabin composed almost exclusively for solo piano and for orchestra. Initially influenced by Romanticism, his style evolved into more abstract and mystical realms, incorporating complex harmonies and unconventional scales. His most famous compositions include piano works like Etudes, Preludes, and Sonatas, as well as his symphonic work Prometheus: The Poem of Fire. 

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Yevgeny Sudbin (born 19 April 1980) is a Russian-born British concert pianist. He studied at the musical school of the Leningrad Conservatory. After his family emigrated to Berlin in 1990, he studied at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler, then at the Purcell School and the Royal Academy of Music in London. Sudbin has lived in the UK since 1997, and made his debut at The Proms in July 2008. In September 2010, he was appointed visiting professor of piano at the Royal Academy of Music. Sudbin has recorded music of Mozart, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Medtner, Scarlatti, and Scriabin for the BIS label.

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