What Classical Music...

[Larry Kart]

Medtner, in my experience, is about as performer-dependent as a worthwhile composer can be. For instance, in Marc-Andre Hamelin’s hands, Medtner’s Sonata Reminiscenza sounds like perfumed sludge (here's one of several YouTube examples of Hamelin massacring Medtner):

The same piece from Emil Gilels, however, is a tragic drama:

And here's Nairi Grigorian (different from Gilels, but she also gets it):

Don't miss Maria Yudina’s Sonata Triad:

or Benno Moisewitsch’s Sonata in G Minor Op. 22:

Medtner’s own recordings of several of his works can be found on YouTube, but it sounds like 1947 (he was age 67) was a bit too late for him in the solo works, though not so, oddly enough, for the two piano concertos (of three). I’ll just link to the first movements of each, but all movements of both can be found on YouTube; the first movement of Concerto 2 is quite something, both as a composition and as a performance:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DViuq6yViyM...feature=related

All my Medtner CDs are inaccessible to me right now, but I recall liking in particular Irina Ossipova’s Forgotten Melodies (Arte Nova) and a set of the Violin Sonatas by Alexander Shirinsky and Dmitri Galynin.

[Alexander Hawkins]

p.s. am I making it up, or is there a Naxos Historical issue of Medtner playing Medtner???

Check this out:

Great - thank you!

[Larry Kart]

Medtner, in my experience, is about as performer-dependent as a worthwhile composer can be. For instance, in Marc-Andre Hamelin’s hands, Medtner’s Sonata Reminiscenza sounds like perfumed sludge (here's one of several YouTube examples of Hamelin massacring Medtner):

The same piece from Emil Gilels, however, is a tragic drama:

Sorry, I screwed up and posted Hamelin's Sonata Reminiscenza twice. Here's the Gilels:

[Larry Kart]

Mr. Kart, you should check into the York Bowen Society if you haven't done so already.

I know Stephen Hough's Bowen disc on Hyperion, and those works are dishwater IMO. Compare Bowen's Ballade No. 2 (1931) to the Ballade (1929) of Bowen's contemporary John Ireland.