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The Marvelous Moszkowski Concerto · The Piano Maven with Jed Distler

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  This is Jed Disler and welcome to the Piano Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano
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  recordings.
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  Back in the late 1960s and early 1970s, a romantic revival was in play as far as piano
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  music was concerned.
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  You had dozens of long forgotten piano concertos from the mid to late 19th century being dusted
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  off after decades of oblivion and neglect.
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  One of these concertos was the E major concerto by Moritz Moskowski, composed in 1898.
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  Moskowski lived from 1854 until 1925.
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  He was born in Breslau and he made his early career in Berlin before settling in Paris.
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  He was primarily known for composing piano music, which is usually virtuosic and lightweight
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  in the best of the salon tradition.
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  But he did also write works in larger forms, including the piano concerto in E major.
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  And this is a pretty substantial work in four movements.
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  Moskowski dedicated the concerto to his pupil, the great pianist Josef Hoffmann, who also
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  happened to have been the dedicatee of Sergei Rachmaninoff's third piano concerto.
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  The Moskowski concerto was actually quite popular in the first decade or so of the 20th
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  century.
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  And as one would expect from Moskowski, the piano writing is brilliant and effective and
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  abounding with great tunes.
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  But the orchestration also is quite ingenuous and varied.
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  Although the concerto basically fell out of favor, it started to generate a little bit
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  of interest in the midst of the Romantic revival.
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  I'm not certain if it was the International Piano Library under the direction of Gregor
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  Benko that issued the work's very first commercial recording.
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  Actually I did see a recording listed in an old catalogue of the Moskowski concerto with
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  pianist Hans Kahn and Walter Ger conducting, but I've never seen a copy nor have I heard
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  it.
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  I'm sure some listeners will fill me in on this.
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  But the International Piano Library LP was both the first and the last of a projected
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  series of releases called The Young Virtuosos.
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  The catalogue number is IPL1001.
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  And this LP included the Moskowski concerto in a live performance with the pianist Karen
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  Goodwin accompanied by a student orchestra.
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  The orchestra leaves a lot to be desired, as does the sound quality.
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  But at least this was one way to hear what the Moskowski concerto sounded like back in
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  the day, more or less.
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  There also was a studio recording that came out around the same time.
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  I cannot tell you whether it came out before or after the IPL disc.
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  But in this studio recording, the featured pianist was Michael Ponte and he was accompanied
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  by the Philharmonia Hungarian with Hans Richard Strach conducting.
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  And this was a much, much better recording than the IPL performance.
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  It came out on the Candide label, which was distributed by Vox.
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  And you can still find the Michael Ponte Moskowski concerto either on CD or probably more immediately
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  you can find it as a download or as a stream.
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  But then we had to wait about a decade before the pianist David Bar-Elon recorded the Moskowski
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  concerto for the Audiophon label with the Bavarian Radio Orchestra conducted by Alfredo
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  Antonini.
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  If you can find this release, it is well worth hearing.
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  David Bar-Elon, I think, is more colorful and suave in this music than Michael Ponte.
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  And you notice this mainly in the scherzo movement's rippling passagework.
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  Bar-Elon's overt and flashy virtuosity stands in contrast to the more refined and nuanced
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  solo work that you hear from the recording by Piers Lane that is part of the Hyperion
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  label's huge and wide-ranging romantic piano concerto series.
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  And this performance has Jerzy Maksimiuk as the conductor with the BBC Scottish Symphony
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  Orchestra.
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  Piers Lane's style of playing is similar to another wonderful pianist who recorded the
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  Moskowski concerto, Janina Fiolkovska.
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  She made an excellent, though rather hard-to-find recording of the Moskowski, issued on the
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  CBC label with Raffi Armenian conducting the Kitchener Waterloo Symphony.
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  There's another recording of the Moskowski.
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  It's on the Omdine label, and it features pianist Mati Raitalio.
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  Leonid Grin conducts the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra.
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  From my taste, this pianist underplays the scherzo, but he's really eloquent and colorful
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  and songful in the Andante.
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  Although it's not quite so well-engineered as either the Omdine or Hyperion Moskowski
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  recordings, I really like the performance of the concerto on Noxus that features the
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  German pianist Markus Paulich and the Polish National Radio Symphony Katowice.
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  I hope I'm pronouncing that right.
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  Anyway, it's a Polish orchestra, and the conductor is Antoni Witt.
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  He is a fantastic conductor.
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  Paulich is closer to the exuberant and incisive kind of virtuosity, characterizing both the
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  Michael Ponte and David Bar-Elon recordings, and he just totally lets rip in the finale.
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  So this is a really good Moskowski concerto to consider.
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  However, it is the most recent recording of the Moskowski that I think stands out from
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  the pack.
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  And the pianist Joseph Moog and the conductor Nicholas Milton truly play off one another
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  in a real conversational chamber-like fashion.
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  And there's a leanness and a transparency to the orchestral textures that really appeals
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  to me.
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  The orchestra is the German Radio Philharmonic of Saarbrücken, and Joseph Moog is no less
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  a colorist than Piers Lane.
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  And this recording is on the Onyx label.
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  It's also coupled with a really good Greek concerto.
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  I wouldn't say this is my tip-top favorite Greek concerto, but it's really quite good.
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  So among the available recordings of the Moskowski concerto, I would say that between Joseph
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  Moog and Piers Lane, that it's six of one, half a dozen of the other when it comes to
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  choosing a version that's sonically up to date and that's in print.
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  But if you can find the David Bar-Elon or the Janina Fjorkowska versions, definitely
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  grab them.
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  This is Jed Disler, and you've been listening to the Piano Maven, your friendly podcast
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  guide to piano recordings.
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  Please let your piano-loving friends and colleagues know about this podcast and spread the good
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  word.
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  Until the next episode, please take care and stay safe.