Ravel: Piano Concerto (CD review)

Also, Stravinsky: Capriccio for Piano and Orchestra; Gershwin: Piano Concerto in F. Ian Parker, piano; Michael Francis, London Symphony Orchestra. ATMA Classique ACD2 2656.

I don't envy any pianist recording Ravel's Piano Concerto these days, having to compete against an acknowledged classic in Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli's magical, 1957 performance, available on an EMI "Great Recordings of the Century" remaster. Nevertheless, young Canadian pianist Ian Parker tries his hand at it (both, actually, and his fingers, too), coming out not the worse for wear and probably the better for the experience.

French composer Maurice Ravel (1875-1937) wrote his Piano Concerto in G major in 1931, the clear result of George Gershwin having swayed his decision to inject some American jazz into his music. Parker makes this connection early on, showing us the direct relationships among the three works on the disc, providing first the results the Gershwin influence and then the influence itself. But, as expected, Ravel adds his own suggestions of dreamy, Romantic expressionism to the mix. Parker gives us a generally light, airy interpretation of the Ravel concerto, the Adagio especially affecting in its gentle grace, poignancy, and composure. The finale is dazzling, of course, with the pianist and orchestra in virtuosic form.

The Capriccio for Piano and Orchestra (1929) by Russian composer Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) is both similar to and different from Ravel's piano concerto. Although both of the works are bright and cheerful, Stravinsky's is altogether darker in places and more exhilarating overall. Stravinsky being Stravinsky, the slow Andante Rapsodico is more than a bit stranger than anything Ravel ever wrote, the movement looking backward and forward at the same time. The closing segment finds Parker again at his best in an almost nonstop drive of rhythmic enchantment. And it is here that we most distinctly notice the impact of Stravinsky's hero, Tchaikovsky, in the music, as well as Stravinsky's own ballets.

The album concludes with one of the works that most greatly must have steered both Ravel and Stravinsky toward the jazz idiom, the Piano Concerto in F by George Gershwin (1898-1937), which Gershwin premiered in 1925. Interestingly, it is only here that Parker and company tend to wander a tad. The music never seems to come alive in the jazzy, bluesy manner of, say, Wild, Previn, or Siegel. It remains pleasant, mind you, and expertly played and presented; it just never appears entirely attuned to the vernacular of jazz, except in the second-movement Adagio, where it reflects the mood of an early Porgy and Bess. The ending is appropriately energetic if still not quite completely persuasive.

Recorded at Abbey Road Studios in 2009, the sound is fairly warm yet natural, with plenty of bass impact and a delicate but clean piano response. While the orchestral accompaniment could have been a touch more open and airy, the midrange more transparent, and the bass better damped, these are relatively minor qualms in an otherwise agreeable acoustic.

JJP