In the first half-minute or so of the Piano Duet Concerto the soloists intone a quiet oppressive Bartokian theme, rear up in atonal recitative, hurl block chords around, and land on an emphatic B major triad. The extreme contrasts are intentional. Schnittke's plan is to lead them to ''temporary reconciliation'' by the end of the 21-minute single-movement structure, thus exploiting the unusual nature of the medium.
Whether the quality of the musical invention fills out the overall concept in an interesting way is a moot point. I heard the concerto in November 1990 at its British premiere in Huddersfield and thought then that it was one of Schnittke's least successful works. It would be a different matter if everything was as clearly focused as the fiery climax around the 15'00'' mark or as the icy conclusion. But as a rule the combination of crude gestural effect and short-winded musical invention is frustrating and unmemorable, despite a performance of the utmost panache by the wives of the composer and the conductor.
If you have been following the Schnittke boom you will have realized that he often compensates for rough-and-ready craftsmanship by some extraordinary flights of imagination. But in his more recent works there is less quotation and less juggling with styles. An overt spirituality has come to the fore, together with, as Alexander Ivashkin's note observes, a play of symbols linking up directly with late Shostakovich.
The Concerto for piano and strings is characteristic in its reliance on disembodied Alberti figurations (shades of the Shostakovich Viola Sonata), incantatory repeated notes and blank-sounding parallel triads. Listening to it I cannot suppress the suspicion that Schnittke is mining an overworked seam and that shifting the onus towards the musical ideas themselves has tended to show up their inferior quality. The queasy microtonal writing in the strings (from 6'20''), the macabre post-Prokofiev Toccata around 8'30'', and the 'maximalist' thumping from 19'30'' (like a blend of Varese and Henry Cowell) are moderately effective; and Postnikova's playing is supremely authoritative. But this one is for dedicated Schnittkerians only, I fancy.'