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Vladimir Ashkenazy's Best "Rach 3?" · The Piano Maven with Jed Distler

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This is Jed Distler and welcome to the Piano Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano
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recordings. I hope you've had a few moments to decompress from our mini series devoted
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to the Beethoven sonatas. And I thank those who took the opportunity to subscribe to this
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podcast through my Piano Maven sub stack page. For those who haven't yet subscribed, I invite
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you to do so. And paid subscribers get added bonuses such as Piano Maven Zoom meeting sessions
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where we will all hang out together for some listening sessions and chatting sessions.
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Sometimes we will have special guest luminaries from the piano world to join us. And there
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are other goodies available to those who take out a paid subscription. You can find my sub
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stack subscription link in the episode description. I've talked about Rachmaninoff's third piano
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concerto before on this podcast. In fact, our fourth episode in our first season covered
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the recording by Alexis Weissenberg and the Chicago Symphony with Georges Pretre conducting
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the Chicago Symphony. Recently, I was asked to contribute the booklet notes for an upcoming
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release on Decca that will offer that live performance from the 2022 Van Cliburn competition
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with pianist Yuchan Lim and the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra conducted by Marin Alsop.
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This was that so-called Rock Three heard around the world. All of the jury members were positively
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gobsmacked by this performance. And the performance certainly played a decisive role in Yuchan
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Lim winning the gold medal. He had also performed all 12 of Liszt's transcendental etudes in
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his semifinal round. And that also left jury members rather speechless, not to mention
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piano-loving viewers around the world, including me. That was an amazing performance. And it
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has been issued on CD. But the Rachmaninoff Third was the topic of a ToneBass.co video
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put together by my friend Ben Laudy, who you probably know from his wonderful Chopin
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podcast and also from his hosting of the Miami Chopin Competition. I'm actually a part of
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every one of his Chopin podcasts, because at the end of each podcast, you see me recommending
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various recordings of Chopin's music. But let's get back to the topic of the Rachmaninoff
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Third concerto, because I'm detouring a lot now. But I want to come back to the topic
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of Rach Three, because I want to bring up a recording that I just stumbled upon in my
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collection. And I hadn't heard it in a while. And it was wonderful to reconnect with it.
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It's a recording that may not be on every piano maven's radar. But I think it's quite
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special. It features the pianist Vladimir Ashkenazi with Eugene Ormandy conducting the Philadelphia
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Orchestra. It was recorded for RCA Victor in 1975. Although Ashkenazi was under contract
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to the DECA label at that time, he did occasionally appear on other labels. For instance, he recorded
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chamber music with violinist Isaac Perlman for the EMI label. That was probably a reciprocal
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agreement in exchange for Perlman to record with Ashkenazi on DECA. But Ashkenazi only
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recorded twice for RCA Victor. My goodness, do you hear the sirens all on the back? I
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wonder what that is. Anyway, the first time that Vladimir Ashkenazi recorded for RCA Victor
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was when he and Isaac Perlman recorded the two Prokofiev violin sonatas. And the second
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and last time that Ashkenazi recorded for RCA was this 1975 recording of the Rachmaninoff
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Third Concerto with Eugene Ormandy in the Philadelphia Orchestra. I don't know what circumstances
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led to this recording being made. Had they performed it in concert? I really don't know.
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But I do remember when this first came out on LP, I was in college and I was kind of
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surprised. I was thinking, why is there a new Rachmaninoff Third from Ashkenazi and
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on RCA? Because, I mean, after all, hadn't he just recorded this concerto for DECA with
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Andre Previn a few years earlier as part of a complete Rachmaninoff Concerto cycle? And
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furthermore, Ashkenazi had recorded Rock III even earlier for DECA in 1963. And there would
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be yet a fourth Rock III from Ashkenazi in 1985 on DECA with Bernard Heiting conducting
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the Concertgebouw Orchestra. So keeping all of that in mind, I would say that on balance,
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the Ormandy version is arguably the best and, to my mind, the most interesting of the four
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Ashkenazi commercial recordings of the Rachmaninoff Third Concerto. It's generally an expansive
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and rhetorical kind of interpretation. It's conceptually similar, if not identical, to
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the 1958 Van Clyburn recording, which also was for RCA Victor. But the Ormandy Ashkenazi
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is better realized in every way. Also, the sonics are much more vivid in detail and much
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more updated, obviously, for 1975. Also, I think that the orchestral support has more
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backbone compared to the softer-edged Andre Previn recording. I can give you one example,
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if you want to research this. At the start of that Poco Piumoso section in the second
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movement intermezzo, in the Andre Previn recording, the solo flute seems kind of lost in space,
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but under Ormandy's watch, the flute is much more prominent and it aligns perfectly with
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the pizzicato strings and the piano. And you get a really excellent chamber music perspective
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here. And I think throughout the Ashkenazi Ormandy recording, you get much more of a
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sense of how the piano and orchestra interact in this concerto. And I think it's an important
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factor because the orchestra often carries much of the melodic interest. And I think
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that's a matter not so much about the placement of microphones than of Ormandy's seasoned
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experience supporting and responding to soloists. He was one of the best accompanists ever in
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the history of recordings. And I think that has to do with why the climaxes seem to have
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more drive and power under Ormandy's watch. And I think that Ashkenazi's pianism has a
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slight edge over his still excellent finger work in his later Bernard Hightink collaboration,
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which I think is a little more straightforward and headlong as an interpretation. I think
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the one with Ormandy is a little more introspective. And incidentally, Ashkenazi plays the heavier
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and thicker of Rachmaninoff's two first movement cadenza options. He played this heavier cadenza
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also with Andre Previn and later on with Bernard Hightink. Although his first recording of
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the Rachmaninoff third from 1963 with Fistullari conducting actually uses that lighter cadenza
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option. That was the one that Vladimir Horowitz preferred. That was the one that Rachmaninoff
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himself recorded. And Yuchun Lim also played that lighter cadenza. So did Martha Argerich
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and Zoltan Koscius for that matter. I think that it's a much better cadenza than the heavier
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one and it fits in more compositionally. I think musically it's much better. The heavier
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cadenza I just don't like. But young pianists trotted out all the time and especially in
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competitions probably because they want to show the jury that they have the chops to
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play this music. But I think musically it's not a very wise decision. That's just my opinion.
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I know others will disagree with me. So at any rate, when I'm in the mood for an introspective
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and poetic and orchestrally oriented Rachmaninoff third concerto rather than the kind of fire
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and brimstone you get from Horowitz or Argerich or Weissenberg, I go to this Vladimir Ashkenazi
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Eugene Ormandy recording. And if you haven't yet heard it, really give it a shot. Give
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it a try because I think you will be pleasantly surprised. This is Jed Disler and you've been
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listening to the Piano Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano recordings. I wish
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you happy listening and I look forward to being with you next time.