Nikolai Lugansky - Liszt: Piano Works (2011)

Nikolai Lugansky delivers this well-programmed album of Liszt pieces with graceful talent and musicianship. Lugansky has done a good job of choosing a variety of pieces that show many facets of the composer as well as his own strengths. For example, Lugansky's hands contribute equally yet uniquely to the two lines of music in Chasse-neige, with its delicate beginning and fast trill-like notes that move into a slow, well-controlled crescendo. Lugansky is in fact a master of the slow crescendo, as in Isolde's Liebestod and Vallée d'Obermann. He executes fast passages with perfect timing and speed, such as in the super-vigorous Étude No. 10 in F minor and the perpetual motion-like Feux-follets, which is as swirly and active as a bumblebee. Lugansky truly understands Liszt and creates the drama necessary to the composer's lines; he knows when to move a phrase forward and when to use subtle rubato to create tension. Étude No. 10 in F minor is another wonderful example of this characteristic of his playing. Liszt was the master of the paraphrase, and Paganini's famous La Campanella is given a wonderful treatment. Lugansky has a miraculous ability of restriking keys that is almost mechanical in its perfect accuracy. Yet the music never loses its bell-like, tinkling beauty, especially in the high register, where it flits like a butterfly. This quality is also present in Les jeux d'eaux à la Villa d'Este, which evokes the water playing and moving quickly and falling in delicate droplets. Another paraphrase by Liszt, Isolde's Liebestod, is of a completely different character. It is more subtle and the melody is more hinted at rather than stated. Though it is not as dramatic as the original work, Liszt substitutes understated grace for excitement and spectacle, and Lugansky creates a truly romantic interpretation that forms a lovely arc from start to finish. It is a joy to hear an album where the artist truly connects with the compositions of the master.