I'm bored stiff by mid-20s, perfectly technically capable and formed pianists churning out YET ANOTHER recording of Chopin Ballades, Beethoven Sonatas, etc. Do they really think they have something new and vital to say?
I did read somewhere that Horowitz wouldn't play Godowsky's Passacaglia making the joke that you'd need four hands to play it.
Hello,I wonder quite some time how we have to see or approach some pianists with respect to their repertoire.Nowadays any named "Great Pianist" devores the Rachs and the Proks.Richter only played the 1st and the 5th.Brendel none of all that to my knowledge. Perhaps attempts as he was young. He said to be affraid of playing Skarbo out of Gaspard de la nuit having heard it played by Pauls Badura Skoda.Richter one day was so upset as he could not overcome a prelude and fugue from the Sjostakovitch Preludes and Fugues.Richter to my opinion could eventually if he wanted play everything.Yefim Bronfman still plays with the Philarmonic the demonically diificult 2nd prokofiev.Ashkenazy to my opinion is underrated as his repertoire and standards set, have seldom or rarely been met. As a Queen Elisabeth winner, competition now live in Brussels, he became a unique pianist conductor much like Barenboim but as it comes to repertoire bigger and technically more difficult than Barenboim.So rating pianists based on their repertoire is not a good idea.Brendel became king of the classical movement.But he had to share the throne with Andras Schiff to my opinion.Richter played as much as he could, on the highest level. How unbalanced in tempi he plays Schubert, his first movement of the D960 nobody dares to take it so long and still make a heavenly piece of it.Rach and Prok or not it is just a question of taste. My fellow country man, 6th at the last Queen Elisabeth played the 3rd Prokofiev.These are competition horses.But Brendel gets 3 cds in the best pianists og the 20th century whereas Weissenberg 1,...And this is unfare. Brendel commercially sold hmself better I think.He one tried to concince Andreas Staier to step over to a Steinway in stead of the pianoforte cause it paid better ? Staier wisely stayed with the pianoforte.And Horowitz's piece was Rach 3... No Prokofiev.Strange how we interpret the repertoire of a pianist, more by the man than the repertoire.But then again, you can ponder down a Prokofiev 2 and go down in an immensely different world like Schubert, and never be able to play Schubert like it should.Greetings from the Queeen Elisabeth competition for piano in Brussels, semi-final week.Ignace.
Topic: Some repertoire too hard for some great pianists ???? 