Soon after the release of Francesco Piemontesi's superb recording of the Liszt Transcendental Etudes comes another, a reminder that what was once considered monstrous and unpayable is now in the repertoires of a great many pianists; particularly young pianists anxious to use the Etudes to impress on the competition circuit And therein lies a question and a challenge. If such outsize Etudes emerge as inflated rhetoric and bombast, then their musical worth becomes debateable. For Alfred Brendel, anxious to stress Liszt's nobility, the reverse of a composer who wrote show pieces designed to appeal to a de-based taste, the fault lies with the pianist not the composer. Again, the Etude's towering quasi-symphonic stature is the reverse of Chopin's exclusively pianistically conceived poetry, also of Liszt's sets of two and three 'Etudes de concert'(the second, subtitled 'caprices poetiques.'
Turning to Yoav Levanon, his performance is masterly at many levels though refreshingly achieving its greatest success in those Etudes that explore the gentler virtues, of lyricism as well as virtuoso opulence. After his storming finish to the un-titled second Etude in A minor he achieves a moving inwardness in 'Paysage'(No 3) There is more than bluster in his 'Mazeppa'(No 4) and if his 'Feux Follets(No 5 and the most intricate and demanding of all Etudes) is less remarkable than from Yunchan Lim in his phenomenal Van Cliburn Competition performance, there is a striking realisation of the mercurial poetry that underlines its flashing surface. He has all of the sombre tread of 'Vision'(No 6), rescuing its daunting climax from any accusation of theatricality, while in 'La RIcordanza'(No 9 and for Busoni like a packet of 'yellowed love letters) he once more provides impressive relief from the more overt Etudes. There is real grandeur in the climax to the vast canvas that is 'Harmonies du Soir'(No 11) and if my overall preference goes to PIetmontesi for his still more finely tuned musicianship(to say nothing of his inclusion of the B minor Sonata) that is in no way to diminish Levanon's command and, in the slower Etudes, innate sense of poetry. Readers in love with this formidable repertoire will hardly need reminding that there are many other versions to both consider and wonder at by Danil Trifonov, Alim Beisembayev, Nelson Goerner and Jean Muller as well as Lazar Berman's and Gyorgy Cziffra's widely discussed and legendary recordings.
Byrce Morrison