Chopin - Piano Concerto 2 [Ax/Ormandy-The Philhadelphia Orchestra]
Only last week i reviewed Weissenberg / Skrowaczewski playing this same Concerto, and the recordings are like opposites, with this one the sound is more duller and bassy, the timings are almost the same, except the middle movement, which is 93 seconds slower here, Weissenberg was brash and up front, Ax is bogged down in the orchestra, i like the former the better, but this was a good experience as well, and i'm certainly warming to Chopin's Piano Concertos.
Emanuel Ax was born in Ukraine, but is now an American citizen, he is now 64, this disc came out in 1984, just before Ormandy died, the front cover shows Ax presumably sitting on his piano stool, facing away from the piano, the lettering is very symmetrical, and RCA certainly like their logos multicoloured, but i like it.
Well i must admit that it was the central movement Larghetto that really got to me this time, it has some beautiful stuff in there, Ormandy takes a nice leisurely view of the movement, Ax comes in dreamily, and plays the main tune with lots of romantic overtones [0:41+], there's real space there for him to develop his ideas, the lovely gentle dive down the keyboard is exquisitely done [2:16-2:23], there's a darker central section [4:22+], where Ax plays very gentle and quiet [4:37-4:42], shimmering low strings, and the basses string low notes in reply, now that's a nice moment, towards the end of this middle section, Ax plays some very delicate work [5:50-6:09], there's a depth of spirituality there, in retrospect the sound isn't as bad as i made out in my opening paragraph, in fact it's really quite good, well this is an amazing achievement for 20 year old Chopin.
Here's Ax playing the second movement on YouTube.
Emanuel Ax was born in Ukraine, but is now an American citizen, he is now 64, this disc came out in 1984, just before Ormandy died, the front cover shows Ax presumably sitting on his piano stool, facing away from the piano, the lettering is very symmetrical, and RCA certainly like their logos multicoloured, but i like it.
Well i must admit that it was the central movement Larghetto that really got to me this time, it has some beautiful stuff in there, Ormandy takes a nice leisurely view of the movement, Ax comes in dreamily, and plays the main tune with lots of romantic overtones [0:41+], there's real space there for him to develop his ideas, the lovely gentle dive down the keyboard is exquisitely done [2:16-2:23], there's a darker central section [4:22+], where Ax plays very gentle and quiet [4:37-4:42], shimmering low strings, and the basses string low notes in reply, now that's a nice moment, towards the end of this middle section, Ax plays some very delicate work [5:50-6:09], there's a depth of spirituality there, in retrospect the sound isn't as bad as i made out in my opening paragraph, in fact it's really quite good, well this is an amazing achievement for 20 year old Chopin.
Here's Ax playing the second movement on YouTube.
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