Subtitled ''Two Leschetizky Pupils'' this dazzling coupling will be snapped up by all lovers of the romantic piano concerto at its most lush and scintillating. Not that Paderewski and Melcer-Szczawinski are similar composers. From the first bar the latter (1869-1928) makes it clear that he has ambitions above and beyond Paderewski's more amiable and domestic charm, and the gauntlet he throws down is taken up with a vengeance by Michael Ponti. Ponti, who has possibly learnt more notes than any other pianist in history, can penetrate even the densest orchestral thicket (Reger is prominent among several other more conventional influences) and his thunder-and-lightning brio when Melcer-Szczawinski roars his passions to the heavens (10'50'') is dazzlingly apt.
Piotr Paleczny, a pianist much acclaimed in his native Poland but too little known here, is hardly less successful in Paderewski's sugar-and-spice Concerto in A minor. Although he hardly erases memories on RCA (5/71—nla) of Earl Wild's sparkling diablerie in the Allegro vivace finale (a Mazurka cocooned in hard icing), his playing is wonderfully musical and engaging. His way with the central Nocturne in particular, would melt a heart of stone, and his handling of Paderewski's decorative flights suggests the most delicate poetic sensibility.
The orchestral contributions are more than adequate (with enthusiastic squeaks from the woodwind egging everyone on in the finale of the Paderewski), and although the recordings range from average (the Paderewski concerto dates from 1982) to impressive (the Melcer-Szczawinski is from 1992), the performances are exemplary. Certainly, lovers of swashbuckling extravaganza need look no further than the Melcer-Szczawinski concerto.'