Brahms - 3 Intermezzi Op117 [Dalberto]My love of Brahms solo piano music continues to grow, of course the Handel Variations and the Ballades remain my favourite, but now these books of shorter pieces [Op116-Op119] are seeping into my heart, they have some tremendously good tunes in them.
Michel Dalberto is a French pianist, born in 1955, he has recorded for Erato, and especially for Denon, some very nice discs indeed, this is quite an old disc, recorded in 1982 [and 1987 for Op117], i got this from a second hand shop in London for £6 or something, a very good buy in the end, the booklet even though it's a bit old, and the green Erato logo is poor, the photo of Dalberto is a good one [by Jacques Sarrat], in a pleasing pose.
How wonderful the opening piece of the Op117 Intermezzi is, and especially the opening of this piece, it has an achingness about it [0:00-1:16], i think Dalberto plays the opening a shade too fast, there's this heart tug at [0:17], it's beautiful, and there's a repetition of the opening at [0:37+], but nice changes start to happen, there's a more sour middle section which follows [1:16-3:20], and then the opening returns [3:20+], innocent as at first, at the end there's a great slowing down for the coda, Brahms Op117 isn't as well known as Op116, but i feel that with Schubert's 3 Klavierstucke [which Brahms named], you can hear where Brahms gets his idea for these pieces, a great discovery for me, and Dalberto is someone to search out more.
Here's Helene Grimaud playing the first Intermezzo of Op117 on YouTube.
