Music For 2 Pianos - CD

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Stringently self-critical, Brahms frequently revised his works; unfortunately, he destroyed most early versions, shutting off any glimpse into his working methods. (The B-major Piano Trio's first version survives, having been published long before he re-wrote it.) The works recorded here are among the exceptions; clearly, Brahms held them in unusually high regard. Both are better known in their later incarnations, and not without reason: the orchestral Haydn Variations glow and sparkle with a myriad colors, and the Sonata (originally a string quintet, quickly discarded) naturally gained expressive depth and breadth along with contrast of sound and texture when transformed into the famous Piano Quintet. But the music is great, and so is this performance: full of sweep, grandeur, warmth, fire, inwardness, romanticism without excess, flexibility without distortion, and ardor without sentimentality. The Variations work better, perhaps because the two versions are intrinsically more dissimilar and independent, and also because the writing itself permits more tonal variety. Indeed, the players give the theme a real wind instrument timbre. In the Sonata, the texture sometimes becomes dense and murky; one misses the radiance of the high strings and the dark sheen of the low ones. However, the superb pianists Emanuel Ax and Yefim Bronfman could easily persuade anyone unfamiliar with these works that this is the only way to hear them. The ensemble is uncanny. The program does not specify which pianist leads, but there is a subtle hint: see if you can find it.