Editorial Product Review: : Emanuel Ax begins his program notes by describing his lifelong love affair with the Brahms Concertos and the never-ending challenges and rewards of performing them. On this 2-CD re-issue of recordings originally made between 1983 and 1997, this love speaks through every note. Playing from deep inside the music, he creates a sense of unhurried expansiveness, caressing the magical melodic and harmonic turns, making transitions and changes of mood and character seem natural and inevitable; his rhythm is unshakable yet flexible enough for perfectly balanced liberties. Making light of what he ...
Editorial Product Review: : Emanuel Ax begins his program notes by describing his lifelong love affair with the Brahms Concertos and the never-ending challenges and rewards of performing them. On this 2-CD re-issue of recordings originally made between 1983 and 1997, this love speaks through every note. Playing from deep inside the music, he creates a sense of unhurried expansiveness, caressing the magical melodic and harmonic turns, making transitions and changes of mood and character seem natural and inevitable; his rhythm is unshakable yet flexible enough for perfectly balanced liberties. Making light of what he ...
Editorial Product Review: :Emanuel Ax obviously knows exactly what to do with all of this music, but he doesn't do it consistently. He plays the difficult Variations with everything perfectly in place, an amazing pianistic feat in itself. This work has some excitement and grand climaxes built into it, and Ax minimizes them, giving us Brahms sounding politer than the composer may have intended. He obviously does what he does on purpose, since he whips up exciting climaxes in the Rhapsodies. He also plays the late Piano Pieces very beautifully, almost enough reason in itself ...
Editorial Product Review: :Emanuel Ax obviously loves Haydn's piano sonatas. This is his second CD of them, and I wouldn't be surprised if he had to argue with his record company to make the discs; Haydn doesn't sell nearly as well as Mozart. But each of these sonatas is a genuine masterpiece, filled with imagination. And, frankly, quality aside, Haydn's piano sonatas are less predictable than Mozart's, less regular in form and quirkier. Ax plays the music fairly straight, expressively but without romantic mannerisms. This is a thoroughly enjoyable disc, and maybe if enough of ...
Editorial Product Review: : Emanuel Ax here offers a fine selection of Chopin, showcasing every aspect of the great Polish composer. The G Minor Ballade is played as poetically as the Scherzos are played expressively, with some of the more chaotic moments presented in the most melodious way. Ax rarely showboats and is mostly interested in Chopin's long lines. His tone is always warm and never brittle; the argument could be made that some of the music is emotionally thornier than Ax acknowledges, but he nonetheless is always communicative, underlining the harmonic daring of the ...
Editorial Product Review: : Emanuel Ax here offers a fine selection of Chopin, showcasing every aspect of the great Polish composer. The G Minor Ballade is played as poetically as the Scherzos are played expressively, with some of the more chaotic moments presented in the most melodious way. Ax rarely showboats and is mostly interested in Chopin's long lines. His tone is always warm and never brittle; the argument could be made that some of the music is emotionally thornier than Ax acknowledges, but he nonetheless is always communicative, underlining the harmonic daring of the ...
Editorial Product Review: essential recording:In his second volume of Chopin on a mid-19th-century Érard, Ax continues to demonstrate both the qualities of the instrument and his own artistry. The best test of the disc is the second movement of the concerto, in which Ax makes the Érard sing, plays with artistic flexibility and taste, and interacts beautifully and convincingly with the period-instrument orchestra. (Chopin's often-maligned orchestration sounds better than usual with these instruments.) Ax turns the waltz into a miniature tone poem in an exquisite performance. The early variations, which led Schumann to proclaim ...
Editorial Product Review: essential recording:In his second volume of Chopin on a mid-19th-century Érard, Ax continues to demonstrate both the qualities of the instrument and his own artistry. The best test of the disc is the second movement of the concerto, in which Ax makes the Érard sing, plays with artistic flexibility and taste, and interacts beautifully and convincingly with the period-instrument orchestra. (Chopin's often-maligned orchestration sounds better than usual with these instruments.) Ax turns the waltz into a miniature tone poem in an exquisite performance. The early variations, which led Schumann to proclaim ...
Editorial Product Review: essential recording:In his second volume of Chopin on a mid-19th-century Érard, Ax continues to demonstrate both the qualities of the instrument and his own artistry. The best test of the disc is the second movement of the concerto, in which Ax makes the Érard sing, plays with artistic flexibility and taste, and interacts beautifully and convincingly with the period-instrument orchestra. (Chopin's often-maligned orchestration sounds better than usual with these instruments.) Ax turns the waltz into a miniature tone poem in an exquisite performance. The early variations, which led Schumann to proclaim ...
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