Peter Rosel - Brahm: Piano Works (1995) [5CD Box Set]

• Title: Brahm: Piano Works
  
• Year Of Release: 1995
  
• Label: Berlin Classics
  
• Genre: Classical
  
• Quality: FLAC (*image + .cue, log, scans)
  
• Total Time: 05:03:43
  
• Total Size: 983 mb (+3%rec.)
  
• WebSite: Album Preview
  

Dating from 1974/75, Peter Rösel’s Brahms recordings first appeared on the former East German Eterna label and were released on CD a few decades later in the West via Berlin Classics. Hopefully this space-saving reissue will help attract many listeners to what I consider the most consistently satisfying Brahms cycle on disc from a single pianist (the contents encompass all the original solo piano compositions with opus numbers, but no transcriptions or arrangements). Highlights include a Third sonata played with extraordinary sweep, judicious poetry, and cohesion, a rhythmically vivacious and refreshingly light-fingered First sonata, a Paganini Variations that bristles with character and impressive technical finish, and virile Op. 79 Rhapsodies. In the small pieces making up Op. 76 and Op. 116-119, Rösel allows the music’s polyphonic rigor to be heard without sacrificing one iota of lyrical tenderness (Op. 118 No. 2 and Op. 119 No. 1, for instance).

Only a few selections fall below Rösel’s general level of excellence. I would have expected the Handel Variations to gain momentum with more dramatic fervor and dynamic contrast than Rösel provides, despite his seamless tempo relationships. And his brisk accounts of the first and fourth Op. 10 Ballades will strike many listeners as too unorthodox and unyielding. These are minor quibbles, of course, and it goes without saying that Rösel’s formidable technique transcends Brahms’ often unwieldy keyboard writing. The sound is fine if a bit airless and dynamically constricted by today’s standards. In sum, this is a first-class Brahms cycle from one of the most underrated pianists in the business.


Tracks:

CD 1 :

Johannes Brahms
Piano sonata No.1 C-dur op.1
Six Piano Pieces op.118
Scherzo es-moll op.4

CD 2 :

Piano sonata No.2 fis-moll op.2
Variations on an original theme op.21 No.1
Eight pieces for piano op.76

CD 3 :

Piano sonata No.3 f-moll op.5
Variations on a theme by Robert Schuman op.9
Four pieces for piano op.119

CD 4 :

Variationen und Fuge über ein Thema von Händel
Balladen, op. 10
Drei Intermezzi, op. 117

CD 5 :

Variations on a theme by Paganini op35, Book1
Variations on a theme by Paganini op35, Book2
Fantasies op.116
Two Rhapsodies op.79

Personnel:

Peter Rosel (piano)

Download:

Isra.Cloud

Complete collected works and multi-disc editions

Classical | Discography | FLAC / APE

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