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Frederic Rzewski's "The People United Will Never Be Defeated!" · The Piano Maven with Jed Distler

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This is Jed Dissler and welcome to the Piano Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano
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recordings.
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I don't engage in politics on this podcast, but when it comes to this year's presidential
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election, I can't think of a more appropriate composition than the late Frederik Zewski's
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36 variations on the Sergio Ortega Chilean resistance anthem, El Pueblo Unido Jamás
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Serra Vincido, The People United Will Never Be Defeated.
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This set of variations is an eclectic virtuoso tour de force that takes both pianist and
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listener on a journey through what amounts to being a history of the piano, from romantic
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etude-like variations to thorny dissonance and haunting minimalism, from blues and folk
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songs to grim marches.
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The 36 variations fall into groups of six and are actually rather rigorously constructed.
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Back in 2015, I presented an episode of my weekly radio show Between the Keys that I
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devoted to The People United to mark this work's 40th anniversary of its composition.
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It was written in 1975.
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My guest on the program was pianist Ursula Oppens, for whom Frederik Zewski composed
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The People United, and she also was the pianist who gave this work its world premiere in Washington,
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D.C. in 1976.
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I have posted a link to that episode in my podcast description so that you can hear extended
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excerpts from the work along with an interview that I did with Ursula Oppens.
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And also on this program, I give a spoken overview about the work.
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I've also posted a link to the booklet notes that I wrote about The People United for the
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recording made by Marc-Andre Hamelin for the Hyperion label.
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So with all of these links handy, I'm not going to talk about this composition in detail,
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but since The People United has been recorded numerous times, and because I'm writing a
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comprehensive guide to The People United on disc for International Piano Magazine, I thought
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I would talk about just a few recorded versions that might help you get started to appreciate
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this work.
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And also the versions I'm going to be talking about have gained some semblance of critical
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consensus over the years.
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However, my article is going to cover each and every People United recording in detail.
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So watch out for that.
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And I promise that I'm not going to be talking about each and every recording on this episode.
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If I did, we'd wind up with a two-hour podcast, and I don't think you want that.
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So I'm just going to talk about a few recordings, and thank you for understanding.
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Now just as a little aside, when I first proposed writing a discographical overview of The People
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United many years ago for Gramophone Magazine, Fredric Jewski was still around.
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And because Fredric and I were great friends and that he was my frequent house guest, we
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would always have long conversations.
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And we played some concerts together on two pianos.
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And when he visited and stayed at my apartment, we often would show each other our compositions
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in progress, and we sometimes would play four hands.
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We'd read through orchestra works and four-hand arrangements.
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And Fredric was just the most incredible sight reader, by the way.
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Anyway, I was thinking about doing this overview about People United recordings, and I actually
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proposed to Fredric that we could collaborate on a written overview that I was going to
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do for Gramophone about all of The People United recordings.
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Or maybe at least he could offer his comments on certain recordings, because we often did
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have conversations about these recordings, and he did talk about which ones he liked
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and which ones he liked less.
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So I had the idea to do something along the lines of, you know, when Igor Stravinsky reviewed
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three different recordings of The Rite of Spring.
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And that's a very famous and interesting article.
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It's famous for Stravinsky's concluding line, which was something to the effect of, none
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of these three recordings are worthy of preservation.
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Unfortunately, Fredric died before he and I could finally get together on our Shefsky
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Review Shefsky project.
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But over the years, I did take note of what he liked and what he didn't like.
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Not that I always agreed with him on these points, I should add.
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So let's go to the recordings and to quote the opening line of Dylan Thomas's Under
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Milkwood, to begin at the beginning.
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Fredric made the very first recording of The People United.
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It was released in 1977 on the small Italian label Edizioni Cultura Populare.
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I've never heard this recording, and only recently I noticed that it had been uploaded
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to a blog, sometime around 2014, but the recording was deleted from this blog long before I could
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download it.
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So if there are any piano maven listeners who have access to this recording, I would
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be very curious and grateful to at least hear it.
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Eventually, Shefsky did re-record The People United, and I'm going to get to his re-recordings
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in a little bit.
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But I will mention Ursula Oppen's 1979 recording for Vanguard.
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It remains a really excellent version, absolutely solid from top to bottom.
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The pianism is as secure and as masterful as you would expect from this fantastic artist.
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It does not have an improvised cadenza, mainly because, as Ursula told me, there simply was
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not room for one given the limitations of the LP.
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But this was the recording that most people imprinted on in the early 1980s, and it was
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available for a while on LP, and it's had some CD incarnations.
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Mark Andre Hamelin recorded The People United for Altaris in the late 1980s.
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This recording was never released, by the way.
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However, Mark's 1997 Hyperion recording raised the bar in many respects for sheer pianistic
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proficiency.
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Now, Frederick told me that he thought that Mark underplayed the march rhythms, but I
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don't agree with that.
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I think Mark's marching is perfectly fine.
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Maybe at times the phrasing can be rounded off to a fault, particularly in variations
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that resemble folk songs, where personally I play these themes in a more plain-spoken,
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less inflected way.
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Mark kind of prettifies them a little bit, but I have to tell you that this is an aesthetic
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choice and it is not a fault by any means.
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His command and his authority and his extraordinary virtuosity really speak for themselves.
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He also has the benefit of great engineering.
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And I wrote the booklet notes, I should tell you.
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I did tell you that before.
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Oh, I do have to tell you that Mark also plays a wonderful and really creative cadenza before
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the theme comes back at the end.
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Igor Levitt got lots of attention a few years back when he released a triple album on Sony
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Classical that consisted of three big variation sets, the Bach-Golberg variations, the Beethoven-Debelli
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variations and Szefsky's People United.
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I like Igor Levitt's People United a lot.
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The really difficult variations pose absolutely no problems for Igor Levitt's fingers and
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he also understands that the march rhythms and variations like number 26 and similar
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places benefit from a steady and resolute gait.
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And I've heard some pianists accelerate these for effect and that's just plain wrong.
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And also Igor Levitt plays a brilliant cadenza.
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I don't know if he wrote it out or he improvised it, but it's really terrific.
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If I had to make one quibble, and this is really a half quibble or a one-third quibble,
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sometimes I want to hear more textural differentiation in thicker contrapuntal passages such as in
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variation number eight.
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And in this variation, I think Ursula Oppens and Szefsky himself clarify the counterpoint
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to a more effective degree and sometimes Igor Levitt tapers the theme when it comes back
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at different places.
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If it was by Grieg or Chopin, I mean you don't need hairpins.
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I would just play the theme plain.
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And you know, I've heard quite a few performances of People United by young pianists who automatically
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apply generic expressive devices throughout and you know it's kind of like a one-size-fits-all
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kind of rubato and you know just don't get me started on that.
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But Igor Levitt is absolutely world-class in People United.
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However, there was one recent recording that in many respects is very unidiomatic, but
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I found it really riveting.
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Although most of the recordings we have of People United differ in detail from Szefsky's
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own performance, they all seem to use Szefsky's self-interpretation as a frame of reference
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or at least a jumping off point.
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However, the recording by Vadim Kolodenko for Harmonia Mundi entirely goes its own way
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in terms of tempo, phrasing, accent, and dynamics.
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And it's essentially a pianistically oriented conception that draws attention to itself
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for sheer virtuosity and prowess and coloristic potential.
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One very telling example of this is the really soft suppleness of Kolodenko's staccato articulation
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in the virtuosic fourth section of Variations.
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There's also a wide degree of tempo fluctuation and fanciful pedaling as if Ignaz Friedman
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had pushed Szefsky off of the piano bench.
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The introspective Variation 27, I think Kolodenko plays way the hell too fast.
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But then again, the last six Variations, which can often seem forced and tacked on, have
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a kind of uncommon urgency and an intense sense of build that leads into this really
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awesome improvised cadenza.
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I have a feeling that Szefsky would have really liked this recording because once when I asked
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Frederick, do you ever get sick and tired of so many people playing and recording the
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people united, especially when you have so much other piano music out there that doesn't
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get equal attention?
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He said to me that he only wanted to hear a young pianist play People United if they
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brought something new and original to the interpretation.
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And certainly Vadim Kolodenko's People United doesn't sound anything like the other versions
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in the catalog, so I have to give him propers for that.
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However, you cannot discuss the People United without looking in on Szefsky's own 1986 recording
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that appeared on the Hat Art label.
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He personally complained about this recording when I asked him about it because I think
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he had issues with the sound quality.
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I don't know.
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I think it sounds perfectly fine.
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I mean the microphone placement is a little close, but I think that only helps to underline
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the forthrightness and the strong rhythmic impact of Szefsky's playing.
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Also he voices chords in a way where the harmonies really sing out and of course his own fantastic
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improvising in the cadenza.
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His recording of People United from the late 1990s that was released on Nonsuch is not
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as strong technically from a pianistic standpoint and the energy seems to flag toward the end.
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But Frederick told me that this was a one take performance.
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He just played the piece straight through and that you're supposed to feel exhausted
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by the end.
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I mean you can't deny the authenticity that, you know, having the composer at the piano,
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but I think his 1986 Hat Art recording preserves Frederick's interpretation in his best pianistic
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estate and there are many live performances of Frederick playing the People United that
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are floating around the internet.
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And there's also a video that was officially released that's basically a straight through
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warts and all performance.
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But I'm saving the best for last perhaps when I talk about Ursula Oppens and her 2014 remake
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of the People United that came out on the Chicago Sede label.
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I prefer this to her 1979 recording.
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First of all the sound is better and her dynamic range opens up so much more.
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I think she's a lot more daring and she reveals more of Frederick's voice leading from variation
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to variation.
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You really get a sense of where the counterpoint is moving.
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And she makes a big difference between Variation 15's folk-like simplicity and Variation 16's
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elaboration.
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And the jagged Variation 19 that usually gets banged out and hits you over the head becomes
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something more playful and acerbic in Ursula Oppens' hands.
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Also her improvised cadenza is lovely.
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It's more lyrical and contained than the wilder, more show-offy specimens in the catalog.
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But I think it's entirely appropriate because her cadenza really helps to set up the theme's
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reinstatement at the very end.
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So which of these versions of the People United to have if you're going to have more than
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one or only one?
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I would definitely try to hear them all.
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And as I said at the beginning of this podcast, there are quite a few worthy contenders that
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I did not discuss, but I will be covering them in my International Piano article about
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every recording ever made of the People United.
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For those who really care about this work, I would definitely recommend trying to find
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Szefsky's own 1986 Hat Art recording.
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I don't know if it's easily available in physical format, so you're probably going to have to
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hunt around for it.
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But overall, the pianistic mastery and the musical authenticity and the mix of intuition
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and insight that informs Ursula Oppen's 2014 recording for Sidi, I think ultimately adds
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up to a first choice.
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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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Thank you for listening, and I look forward to being with you for our next episode.
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Take care.