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The Fiorentino Saga · The Piano Maven with Jed Distler

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  This is Jed Disler, and welcome to The Piano
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  Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano recordings.
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  You can subscribe to The Piano Maven podcast
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  through my Substack page by clicking on the link
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  in the episode description. Paid subscribers
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  get bonuses such as downloads of the month and
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  Piano Maven Zoom meetings where we talk about
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  our listening experiences and our various piano
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  obsessions. So please consider subscribing and
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  help us reach out further into the piano community
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  to keep this podcast in production. As many of
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  you may know, I have great admiration for the
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  Italian pianist Sergio Fiorentino, who lived
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  from 1927 until 1998. He had a kind of atypical
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  career. He started off with tremendous success
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  in Europe and South America and New York in the
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  late 40s and early 1950s. He suffered injuries
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  in a 1954 airplane crash that set him back for
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  several years before he could resume his activities.
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  Over time, he gradually retreated from public
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  performance and concentrated mainly on teaching,
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  although he did He gave concerts in Italy and
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  also made a lot of broadcast performances. However,
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  starting in 1992, he began to record and perform
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  again in earnest, thanks in great part to the
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  encouragement and support of a great admirer
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  of his, Ernest Lumpe, who was a German record
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  collector who had been avidly collecting and
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  researching Fiorentino's discography. Ernst Lampe
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  had arranged for Fiorentino to record again,
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  and these new recordings generated a newfound
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  international interest in Fiorentino's artistry.
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  So the pianist gave performances in Germany and
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  France and Taiwan and in the United States in
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  the 1990s, and he performed several times at
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  the Newport Festival in Rhode Island. And in
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  Providence, Rhode Island, and also in Boston,
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  he gave two recitals at New York's Alice Tully
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  Hall in 1997 and 1998. And I attended both of
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  those. They were really wonderful concerts. And
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  I also had a chance to interview Mr. Fiorentino
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  for Piano Today magazine. I remember that he
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  was very kind and modest. At the end of the interview,
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  after I had packed my tape recorder, he started
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  improvising on a piano, and just on the spur
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  of the moment, and knowing that I also improvised,
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  he beckoned me to join him on a second piano.
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  And that little improvisation only lasted about
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  20 or 30 seconds. It didn't really seem like
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  anything special, but all I can think of is that
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  I... I'm so sorry that I had packed my tape recorder,
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  because it would have been a lot of fun to have
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  preserved that improvisation. My colleague, Emilio
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  Pessina, who is the director of the Rhine Classics
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  label, that's R -H -I -N -E, Rhine Classics,
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  he has brought out several important Sergio Fiorentino
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  releases. A few years ago, he issued a box set
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  called Sergio Fiorentino Live in USA, which is
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  a nine -disc set containing just about all of
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  Fiorentino's existing live and radio performances
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  from the 1996, 97, and 98 American concerts.
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  But most recently, he's brought out this wonderful
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  10 -CD box set. containing Fiorentino's complete
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  recordings for the British Saga label. They've
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  all been carefully remastered from the best existing
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  sources, meaning either surviving master tapes
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  or from pristine vinyl copies in Ernst Lumpus'
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  collection. These are all presented in original
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  jacket facsimiles with full discographical information
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  and booklet notes that contain important documentation
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  pertaining to the recording sessions, and also
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  the notes clear up several quote -unquote gray
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  matters of discographical provenance. Saga was
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  just one of the several labels operated by William
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  Barrington Coop, for which Fiorentino recorded
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  between 1953 and 1966. The other labels were
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  Fidelio, Delta, and Concert Artist. The recordings
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  made by Fiorentino for Fidelio, Delta, and Concert
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  Artist that did not involve music of Franz Liszt
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  appeared a few years ago in this 10 -CD box set
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  on Piano Classics that was entitled Sergio Fiorentino's
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  Early Recordings, 1953 -1966. And there was another
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  piano classics box containing Fiorentino's complete
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  list recordings, not only for these three labels,
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  but also the list selections issued on Saga,
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  plus the later list recordings from 1992 that
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  appeared on the APR label. So, in a roundabout
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  way, basically everything in this new set of
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  the complete Fiorentino recordings for Saga.
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  appears on CD for the first time, save for the
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  list selections. I only mention this because
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  Fiorentino's Saga recordings of Beethoven's 32C
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  minor variations, Schumann's Carnival, and the
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  Chopin Waltzes are not to be confused with alternate
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  versions in the Piano Classics early recordings
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  box. Sorry to be so convoluted about this, but
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  I just wanted to give some discographical housekeeping
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  for whatever that's worth. But anyway, let's
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  talk about this box set with the Sagar recordings.
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  It's a fabulous collection, and Fiorentino's
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  tremendous virtuosity and his strong personality
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  inform each and every selection. The Beethoven
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  Emperor and Tchaikovsky First and Liszt E -flat
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  and Schumann A -minor concertos, faster movements.
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  But that really doesn't matter because it's still
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  exciting and convincing playing. And the Hamburg
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  Pro Musica plays much better than that era's
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  pickup orchestra norm. It's very good orchestra
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  playing. Also, Fiorentino plays the Gershwin
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  Concerto with a lot of idiomatic pizzazz. That
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  was really quite a surprise, although maybe I
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  shouldn't have been surprised. And Hugo Ringgold
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  conducts the London Philharmonic, and it's a
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  really vivacious accompaniment. And the Gershwin
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  Concerto is presented both in a mono transfer
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  and also in a superior stereo remastering. from
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  the original master tapes, and this stereo version
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  has different takes and the slow movement for
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  whatever that's worth. Beethoven's C minor variations
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  on Saga receives a really dramatic and dynamically
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  contrasted reading that I think stands along
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  with the work's finest recordings. It's true
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  that some of Fiorentino's fast tempos in Schumann's
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  Carnival border on being glib, but you really
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  can't deny that his fingerwork is just so scintillating,
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  and it's really fun to hear. Collectors who may
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  be familiar with Fiorentino's 1990s recordings
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  of the Liszt ballades and the funerai will find
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  these earlier saga versions much more mercurial
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  in regard to tempo extremes, and also technically
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  fresher. And the fanciful rubatos and voicings
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  and agogics throughout the Chopin waltzes are
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  really old school in the best way. And in the
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  Chopin preludes, opus 28, there are numerous
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  details that are going to catch listeners off
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  guard, such as Fiorentino's super, super slow
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  motion tempos for the second prelude and the
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  ninth prelude. He has some very subjective phrasing
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  and textural highlighting in numbers five and
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  eight that I find very fascinating. There's nothing
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  routine at all about Fiorentino's Chopin Nocturnes.
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  These were issued in 1974 in stereo on Saga.
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  I don't know if they came out before, but these
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  recordings were made much earlier. but they're
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  wonderful and interesting performances. He scales
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  down the dynamics in that E -flat Nocturne, Op.
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  55 No. 2, concentrating much more on the refined
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  interplay between the right hand's duet voices
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  and the rolling left -hand accompaniment. He
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  also sustains Op. 48 No. 1's opening section
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  really gripping crawl. This is slow motion playing
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  at its best. And that famous E -flat nocturne,
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  Op. 9 No. 2's familiar melody just floats over
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  the bar lines. After a while, you notice that
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  hardly one measure goes by in exactly the same
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  tempo. Yet Fiorentino's sense of timing and proportion
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  and organic flow just make everything cohere.
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  It's an amazing performance, actually. You have
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  to listen to it a few times to really absorb
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  what Fiorentino is doing. I talked about the
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  remasterings before, and the transfers largely
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  stem from superb digital remasterings from clean
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  copies of original LPs supplied by Ernst Lumpe,
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  who, as I said before, knows more about Sergio
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  Fiorentino than I think he's certainly the world's
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  foremost authority on Fiorentino's recorded legacy.
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  And he also is the author of this collection's
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  thoroughly documented and informative booklet
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  notes. So it goes without saying that all of
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  my fellow Sergio Fiorentino fans should get hold
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  of this release without... Any question, grab
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  it while you can. This is a really, really important
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  and very enjoyable box set. This is Jed Disler,
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  and you've been listening to The Piano Maven,
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  your friendly podcast guide to piano recordings.
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  And thank you so much for tuning in, and I look
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  forward to being with you next time.