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Edna Stern's Schumann Carnaval plus · The Piano Maven with Jed Distler

• 0:05
  This is Jed Disler, and welcome to The Piano
• 0:08
  Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano recordings.
• 0:12
  Consider taking out a paid subscription to The
• 0:15
  Piano Maven, and you will find a link to do so
• 0:19
  through my Substack page. The link is listed
• 0:23
  in our episode description, and your support
• 0:26
  will help keep this podcast going for the rest
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  of the year. Sometimes it takes me months or
• 0:34
  even years to catch up with new releases, and
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  by the time I get to them, they are not new releases
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  anymore. On the other hand, I've started to define
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  a new release as a recording that you do not
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  yet know about or have not heard. So, in effect,
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  the release may be old to the marketplace, but
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  it's new to your ears. Although I still get sent
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  physical product to review, most of the time
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  I have to access new releases in the form of
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  digital files, and they're often just sent to
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  me. And in order to free up space on my computer,
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  I wind up storing these files on hard drives.
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  And of course, the hard drives are backed up
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  in triplicate so that if... one of the drives
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  crashes, and I still have two others, and I haven't
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  lost any data. And then, of course, I have to
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  buy a third drive. Anyway, I was looking through
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  one of these hard drives in search of a recording
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  for my radio show, Between the Keys, and I noticed
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  this 2024 release that I had meant to check out
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  a year ago when it first appeared. But for some
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  reason, I kept putting it off. I don't know why.
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  I think just because there's such a backlog of
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  things to review. Anyway, I finally got a chance
• 2:00
  to listen to this all Schumann recital by the
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  Belgian -Israeli pianist Edna Stern on the Orchid
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  Classics label. And I've provided a link to this
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  release in the episode description. I've written
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  about several of Edna Stern's recordings over
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  the years. On one hand, I am a huge fan of her
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  Bach playing, which is unabashedly old -school
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  Bach playing, meaning that her playing exploits
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  the modern concert grand sonorities and colors
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  and dynamics and potential for expression, and
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  her approach to this anachronistic Bach style.
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  always seemed genuine and organic and deeply
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  felt to my ears. But on the other hand, I found
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  a Chopin release that Edna Stern did for the
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  naive label some years ago to be impossibly mannered,
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  but even more so, it just seemed rhythmically
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  spineless and expressively random and rather
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  wishy -washy. And then she came out with this
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  release called Schubert on Tape, which she recorded
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  using analog tape. I think her goal was to try
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  to capture the sound of early 1950s piano recordings,
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  as well as the spirit of certain artists from
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  that era who she admired on record. But I found
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  her interpretations to be rather square and careful
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  on this disc because she was adamant about avoiding
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  the use of editing. But the ironic thing is that
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  all the pianists who she admired on these early
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  LPs did use tape editing, or at least a minimum
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  of tape editing, but that's another story. However...
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  Her Schumann release for Orchid Classics I think
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  is generally more successful, and it benefits
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  from updated sound and most likely some studio
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  editing. Her interpretation of Carnival Op. 9
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  has a lot of interesting and creative ideas.
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  I kind of like her coy rubato and her subtle
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  inflections throughout the Valse a la Monde movement
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  and where Paganini interrupts. and she tosses
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  off Paganini's difficult cross rhythms with great
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  musicality, and she doesn't make this little
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  sequence sound like an etude for once. The quick
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  papillon movement doesn't have that relentless
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  drive that one often hears, but there is a lightness
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  and playful quality and variety of voicing that,
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  to my ears, conjures up images of butterflies
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  instead of the usual sports cars that pianists
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  often evoke. And these same qualities create
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  a very attractive effect in the florestan movement.
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  But elsewhere, Edna Stern's rubatos tend to wander.
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  Her rhythms sometimes lose their center. And
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  movements where you really need drive and momentum,
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  such as the work's opening and closing movements,
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  lack just that drive and momentum. I get more
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  of a sense of little vignettes that are casually
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  strung together, rather than little vignettes
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  that are bound into a larger narrative scheme.
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  And also, curiously, in Carnival, Edna Stern
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  has the habit of leaning on the first note of
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  a piece, putting a fermata on it or a tenuto.
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  And she does this often, and it seems like a
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  mannerism. But for some reason, such expressive
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  meanderings and the occasional feeling of underplaying
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  seem to work better throughout Kindersehnen.
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  although the result is that you get less contrast
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  in Kindersein and between extroverted and introspective
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  pieces. But I don't mind Edna Stern, for example,
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  rounding off that little hoppy horse piece and
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  playing around with inner voices. It's very charming
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  in its way, but in the piece Umkommen, she broadens
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  that first downbeat as usual, only to speed up
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  as if making up for lost time. Is this expressive
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  or is it just a mannerism? I leave it to you
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  to decide. Still, you can't deny Edna Stern's
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  genuine musicality and sincerity. And she closes
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  this release with what appears to be her opus
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  one as a composer. And the piece is called...
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  tonal or not tonal. Actually, she has a little
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  hyphen between T -O and N -A -L, so maybe you
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  pronounce it tonal or not tonal, or tonal or
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  not tonal, I don't know. Basically, this piece
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  sounds like somebody improvising bits and pieces
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  of Schumann or Schubert or early Scriabin at
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  random, and at nine and a half minutes, it never
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  really gets going. nor does it assume a strong
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  shape. And essentially, it overstays its welcome.
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  But admittedly, there are a lot of good ideas
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  in this piece. And I think it's great that more
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  and more concert pianists these days are stepping
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  up to the plate as composers. I think all performers
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  should be encouraged to compose or to improvise
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  because the more you do it, the better you probably
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  will get. Well, maybe not in every case. Perhaps
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  if Edna Stern develops the composer side of her
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  musical personality further down the road, maybe,
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  just maybe, it will help sharpen and focus her
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  interpretations and to help give stronger shape
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  to her creative, interpretive impulses. Just
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  a thought. This is Jed Disler, and you've been
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  listening to The Piano Maven, your friendly podcast
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  guide to piano recordings. I look forward to
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  being with you next time for our next episode.