Monday 15 May 2006

Evergreens. I enjoyed Rachmaninov's second piano concerto played by Boris Berezovsky (Urals Philharmonic). Boris's playing has always appealed to me; it's strong and fluent, but also sensitive and intelligent. He doesn't storm the barn in Rach 2, but lets the music speak for itself (never a bad thing to do in emotion-charged Russian pieces). It comes over similar to Rachmaninov's own performance. No higher praise.

I also much enjoyed Philippe Graffin's recording of the Elgar violin concerto (coupled, very appositely, with Chausson's Poème). Again, no nonsense from Graffin, no wallowing, no meandering; the Elgar concerto doesn't need it. A lucky concerto on disc, and Graffin's is one of the best. Nice to find so many younger violinists keeping the piece in the repertoire (Isabelle van Keulen and Hilary Hahn, recently).

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