Mussorgsky Piano Works

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Record and Artist Details

Composer or Director: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Modest Mussorgsky

Label: Teldec (Warner Classics)

Magazine Review Date: 1/1989

Media Format: Vinyl

Media Runtime: 0

Mastering:

DDD

Catalogue Number: 6 44088

Tracks:

Composition	Artist Credit
Pictures at an Exhibition	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Elisabeth Leonskaja, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Sonata for Piano	Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Composer Elisabeth Leonskaja, Piano Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Composer

Composer or Director: Modest Mussorgsky

Label: Helicon

Magazine Review Date: 1/1989

Media Format: Cassette

Media Runtime: 0

Mastering:

DDD

Catalogue Number: CHLR143

Tracks:

Composition	Artist Credit
Pictures at an Exhibition	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Gopak	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Souvenirs d'enfance, Movement: First punishment: Nurse shuts me in a dark room	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Intermezzo in modo classico	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
(Ein) Kinderscherz	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
(Une) Larme	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Au village	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer

Composer or Director: Modest Mussorgsky

Label: Helicon

Magazine Review Date: 1/1989

Media Format: CD or Download

Media Runtime: 59

Mastering:

DDD

Catalogue Number: CD-HLR143-2

Tracks:

Composition	Artist Credit
Pictures at an Exhibition	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Gopak	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Souvenirs d'enfance, Movement: First punishment: Nurse shuts me in a dark room	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Intermezzo in modo classico	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
(Ein) Kinderscherz	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
(Une) Larme	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Au village	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer

Composer or Director: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Modest Mussorgsky

Label: Teldec (Warner Classics)

Magazine Review Date: 1/1989

Media Format: Cassette

Media Runtime: 0

Mastering:

DDD

Catalogue Number: 4 44088

Tracks:

Composition	Artist Credit
Pictures at an Exhibition	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Elisabeth Leonskaja, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Sonata for Piano	Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Composer Elisabeth Leonskaja, Piano Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Composer

Composer or Director: Modest Mussorgsky

Label: Helicon

Magazine Review Date: 1/1989

Media Format: Vinyl

Media Runtime: 0

Mastering:

DDD

Catalogue Number: HLR143

Tracks:

Composition	Artist Credit
Pictures at an Exhibition	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Gopak	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Souvenirs d'enfance, Movement: First punishment: Nurse shuts me in a dark room	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Intermezzo in modo classico	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
(Ein) Kinderscherz	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
(Une) Larme	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer
Au village	Modest Mussorgsky, Composer Marios Papadopoulos, Piano Modest Mussorgsky, Composer

Author: Christopher Headington

The name of Elisabeth Leonskaja was unknown to me, but on the evidence of the present Teldec issue she can give an assured account of the Mussorgsky Pictures. But she is up against a very strong field in this repertory, and listening to her in the more atmospheric pieces I do miss a necessary imagination. I think this is partly because she plays in a slightly dry way, particularly as regards pedal, and the music needs richer and more varied sonorities. But basically the interpretation disappoints. For example, ''Gnomus'' should crackle—and cackle with more power and grotesquerie than this, and while the leisurely tempo for ''The Old Castle'' is quite effective, I wish that it had more half-lights tonally. Similarly, the various Promenades could be more contrasted. Also ''Bydlo'' strikes me as merely heavy where it requires patient weariness, and neither the playful children in the ''Tuileries'' gardens nor the emerging chicks in their ''Ballet'' sound young and bright-eyed—the latter being energetic enough but lacking flexibility and humour, qualities also needed in the picture of ''The Market Place at Limoges''. The piece depicting the two Polish Jews ''Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle'' is hurried (1'53'' as against Marios Papadopoulos's 2'29'') and again insufficiently characterized. And so I could go on; suffice it to say that this is not a version to compete with the more vivid Ousset (EMI), Ashkenazy (Decca) and the incomparably imaginative Brendel (Philips), who has real grandeur and is for me the first choice among current versions—though Ashkenazy's CD has the special interest of including both piano and orchestral versions, the pieces in the latter (interestingly) being almost invariably a little slower despite having the same artist in charge. The chief interest of Leonskaja's disc is probably the Tchaikovsky G major Sonata, but again I'm unable to warm to playing of rather wearying attack and in the slower second movement she does not fully hold the structure together, while the scherzo too is not really giocoso. The rather clattery recording does nothing to mellow her harsh forte and though from 1988 it falls short of what we now expect of piano sound.
The performance of the Pictures by Marios Papadopoulos is much better (and still more recently) recorded, with attractive and wide-ranging sound, in Bishopgate Hall in London, the city where this Cypriot pianist came to live in 1967 and from which base he has established himself on the international scene. His playing is more imaginative and idiomatic too than that of Leonskaja; here, for example, is an ''Old Castle'' redolent of shadow and sadness. There's much to enjoy in this version and I only query the pianist's tendency to play faster music (and ''Bydlo'') too rapidly and sometimes too loudly—there is some pretty impatient promenading (a fault also in Cecile Ousset's account) and the ''Limoges'' movement is too toccata-like. But ''Baba-Yaga'' is thrilling although I have heard better tremolandos. ''The Great Gate of Kiev'' has a grandeur that I miss in Leonskaja's performance but also an apparently misread chord in the second line of the last page. The other Mussorgsky pieces are of more than passing interest and are nicely done; but they're fairly familiar and I would like to see still further exploration of this repertory. Proceeds from sales of this worthwhile CD will go to the A. G. Leventis Foundation for the restoration of ancient monuments on Cyprus: a good cause.'

Mussorgsky Pictures at an Exhibition

Pictures at an Exhibition

Sonata for Piano