Brahms: Piano Concerto No. 2; Piano Sonata No. 1 [Original recording remastered]

This is the greatest recording, or performance, of any piece of music I have heard in my 60 years of life. To begin with, the music is beyond comprehension in its greatness. But, Richter and Leinsdorf and the CSO connected in a once-in-a-lifetime partnership that occurred only by accident (Reiner's illness).
Richter played this ideally, giving Brahms' passionate soul and classical mind equal weight. He didn't dawdle like many recent pianists do. He brought Russian passion to the score, but held on to the Germanic depth of feeling and substance. I give great credit to Leinsdorf, a normally underwhelming conductor. He seized the romantic impulses in the music and plunged ahead with full force, not afraid to let the brass have their say along with the deep strings, creating a richness of sound unequaled in any other version of this work that I've heard.
This performance is ideal for people who see this work as essentially symphonic, rather than a vehicle for solo showiness. Richter complies with an interpretation both powerful and fleet of foot ( a rare combination), without losing the many subtleties in the score. In other words, he performed it the way people tended to in the 1880s, rather than the 1980s, when every note was separated and examined under a microscope. The pianist and conductor see this as one piece of music, not thousands of notes collected together.
The new remastering is, well, masterful. The original recording was impressive sonically, especially in the midrange, and the new 24 bit remastering brings this out magnificently (and quietly), perfectly complementing the performances of Richter, Leinsdorf, and the CSO.
This is not a performance for everyone. If you like your Brahms interpretted as if he were Mozart, or Tchaikovsky, this will either be too powerful or too fast for your taste. If you like your Brahms to continue on the path that Beethoven opened up, this is nonpareil in every respect.
Near the end of his life (30 years after the fact), Richter disavowed this performance. He complained that Leinsdorf pushed the pace too quickly. This is not the first case of a great artist (the greatest pianist we have on record, in my opinion), revising his early ideals as age caught up to him. Artists have often shown throughout the centuries, that they are not the best critics. I think that history will prove Richter's, and Leinsdorf's, initial instincts correct, as I have thought and felt since my first hearing of this amazing record in 1961.

This famous recording of the Brahms Second with Richter used to be unrivaled and still stands at the top of the field. Richter possesses so much power and authority, yet can be so restrained and mysterious when he wants, that no one quite challenges him. In memory he barnstormed more than he actually does here; Pollini and Barenboim are almost as virtuosic. Even after forty years, however, there are moments when no one can phrase like him--Richter seems to think in paragraphs, not single passages--and he remains the only pianist who makes you believe this incredibly challenging work is easy to play. (At 44 min. this is also one of the fastest Brahms Seconds on CD.)

The weakness of this recording is two-fold. The recorded sound is a bit brittle and thin (now coniserably improved in RCA's current remastering). Richter isn't given the gorgeous sonority one hears from Pollini on DG with Abbado (particulary their 1995 remake in digital sound). And Leinsdorf, if better than his usual literal self, at times seems to impede what Richter wants to do. They open the first movement in different worlds, but after that, Leinsdorf manages to gather enough momentum to keep up with his soloist. One wonders how unleashed Richter would have been if the shceduled conductor (I think it was Reiner) hadn't bowed out.

Those two drawbacks aside, this superb CD will never go out of print. As you listen to Richter so totally dominate the closing pages, you feel glad about that--every future improvement in sound will make the performance more alive. The coupling is his equally acclaimed performance of Brahms's youthful First Sonata, in all its rambling glory. The pianist was much older, in his early seventies, when this live account from 1988 was captured. The piano sound is a bit too clangy and brittle, but in this repertoire Richter was competing only with himself.

This is a budget-priced reissue and remastering of what I've read was long the dominant recording of what's come to be one of my favorite piano concertos. Russian pianist Richter recorded this in 1960 during his first American tour; he recorded the early sonata almost thirty years later in Germany.

Richter's performance of the concerto definitely sounds fleeter than what I'm used to; this seemed like it was over in no time! I had to check his timing of the first movement against that of the other two recordings I have: Richter/Leinsdorf 16:43, Gilels/Jochum 18:22, Cliburn/Reiner 17:49. Total time: Richter/Leinsdorf 46:46, Gilels/Jochum 51:44, Cliburn/Reiner 48:21. In any case, Richter's pianism is alternatingly brawny and delicate with fine phrasing and judgement of shifting dynamics. The meltingly beautiful andante third movement is also played somewhat swiftly, but Richter's quiet, introspective probing in conjunction with the cello solo from the orchestra is a paragon of pianistic poetry, though it didn't make my dry eyes well up as Gilels' did. The recorded sound is just fine, but could never be mistaken for a modern recording.

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