Sons/Rondos [Import]

For fun, play this album to a music lover and let him/her try to guess the composer. Some pieces sound like they could have been written in the 20th century.

I was surprised to find a passage in one of the later tracks that Emanuel later orchestrated for one of the Hamburg symphonies. (sorry - can't put my finger on it right now).

I agree with the previous review regarding the sound. I thought it was played on an antique piano at first, it sounds so strange.

CPE Bach has been a staple of the repertoire of clavichord, harpsichord and fortepiano players. Among others the dutchies van Asperen, Leonhardt and Uittenbosch have recorded may of his works.
When it comes to CPE Bach played on piano, there is not too much around worth mentioning. One notable exception is Gould's rendition of CPE's Wuerttenberg Sonata nr. 1. In addition, I was once at a concert by Malcolm Frager during which he played Wuerttenberg Sonata nr.2, a performance that I enjoyed for many years after taping the radio broadcast of this gig.

It should come as little of a surprise that the interpreters mentioned above have offered a variety of approaches to the diverse works of CPE. Yet, all have them have shared a central characteristic: seeing CPE as the main representative of the early Sturm und Drang, people as diametrically opposed as Gould and Leonhardt have fleshed out the theatrical almost declamatory drama that many of these works exude. While studying the 6 Wuerttenberg Sonatas myself, I always had the feeling like having Olivier or Gielgud in the room with me giving recitations from Shakespeare.

How to play CPE?
Well as a matter of fact he left us with a standard work on keyboard practice: Versuch ueber die wahre Art das Klavier zu spielen (Essay on the correct way of playing the keyboard). While listening to this disc I pulled it off the shelf for some words of wisdom. Citing from chapter 20 titled von den Manieren (about approaches/manners/mannerisms) paragraph 2: however useful the Manieren can be, as great is the damage when either the wrong ones are chosen, or when the right ones are used at the wrong moments or in the wrong context. CPE comments that many German composers gave the players little indication on which Manieren needed to be applied and him self goes into minute detail on both dynamic and rhythmic accentuation. The problem with even this book for a current reader is to determine how much louder/softer faster/slower CPE was actually talking about. Clearly no definitive answers in his Essay either, which is not so bad altogether since I for one think that the terms right and wrong are pretty meaningless when it comes to interpretative art.

So here we have Pletnev presenting us with a very generous 78+ minutes of CPE. Since walking into a recording of JS Bach's 6th Partita in the early eighties I have followed this very talented and virtuoso pianist/conductor through a variety of repertoire. My favorites in his discography are his Scarlatti Sonatas as pianist and Tchaikowsky Symphonies as conductor. Even when I was not overwhelmed by the final result of his interpretations like in his Chopin and Liszt recordings, I did have to admit that he had put a good deal of thought to the respective composers in order to come up with his personal renditions.
Upon announcing this disc on their website, Deutsche Grammophon already stated that this recording would likely stir up a controversy and they may be right. This is CPE Bach that is strikingly different from all the interpretations that I mentioned before. Think getting a frozen Margerita while expecting spiced cider, when making the rounds at Halloween. Listening to it for the first time gave me the same feeling I had in August 1982 when listening to Gould's Haydn double lp. It is so shockingly deviant from the "norm" that you initially don't even know what to think of it. Yet, just like with Glenn's interpretation Pletnev's rendition is the result of a deep examination of the composer, that upon a second listening session changes from shocking to stunning.

For starters the playing is extremely analytical and seems to deliberately shun away from the dramatic to emphasize the virtues of its architecture. It is clear that Mikhail, after finishing CPE's Versuch must have thought: less is more. This analytical approach is very effective in drawing the listener into the works. It is really very interesting to follow Pletnev while examining CPE's process of composition and while exposing the similarities and differences between CPE and his contemporary Haydn. Whereas the latter composer early on already had the 'classical' tendency to move on to the next theme when the old one seemed to be getting a little stale, CPE in Pletnev's hand follows a pathway that is clearly rooted in the education that he received from his father. As a consequence of this very even interpretation that doesn't involve most of the valleys and mountains in tempo and dynamics, that for me have always characterized CPE, you almost feel like being present at the moment of creation of the roots of the classical style. It often feels like Pletnev asks the question- what do you think CPE will do next?- before providing each answer.These answers highlight CPE's great sense of harmonical progression and show that these works are far less improvisatory than other interpreters may have had you believe. This approach does, of course have his down side, from which the slow movements suffer at least a little. In his Versuch CPE points out very clearly that different approaches should be followed in slow versus fast movements. Pletnev approaches them very similarly. As such, the dramatic gestures that many of the slow movements exude gets lost and, while listening to this disc for the first time, most slow movements were not even half way before I already started wondering what would be next.

In all, Pletnev seems to have approached this project as a reexamination of the composer and the birth of the style that we now call classical. Apart from skill, the analyses and performances are all top notch, it takes quite a bit of courage and time to produce a disc like this one. Of course there will be the contingent of Basil Valentines who will state this is all wrong, but please be so wise as to ignore them before making up your own mind.

The recording is good, but again a little strange. The sound is clear, without being bright. There are excellent dynamics and the piano sounds good. The only thing that is oddly missing is a sense of placement of the piano in the soundstage. This gives you the feeling of listening to a performance that got beamed in extremely clearly from a distant galaxy.

Pletnev, in despite of a pretty hectic schedule, devoted a lot of time in rethinking CPE Bach. Listening to this disc initially felt like hearing Webern while expecting Berg, yet Mikhail's abilities and insights won me over quite easily. Let's leave with a simple notice: if you're seriously into piano playing this is a mandatory disc.