Goldmark: Complete Works for Piano, Vol. 1

Album review

Karl Goldmark's most famous compositions are large-scale orchestral or stage works, such as the Violin Concerto and the opera The Queen of Sheba. He is not at all known for his piano music. His piano studies were even more self-directed than his violin, theory, and composition studies were. According to his memoirs, he only took up the piano at the age of 20 so that he could earn money by coaching singers and giving piano lessons. He must have been a thorough self-teacher, because the music on this disc, as performed by Tihamér Hlavacsek, rarely sounds unpianistic, and often more virtuosic than what would be expected from a self-taught pianist. These are all character pieces, some sounding more like etudes than others, but all with distinct moods and personalities, a few even narrative in nature. The variety of the music is also unique. There are traces of the great composers such as Chopin, Liszt, Schumann, and Brahms in it, but there is also an originality that is hard to describe. Occasional interesting shifts of harmony, sharply contrasted dynamics, and even seemingly unrelated sections exist in Goldmark's writing. "Bedrägnis" is like a Chopin etude, with a harmonically quirky string of Scotch snaps in the right hand, with a quieter, calmer, pensive central section, which later becomes a majestic coda. Hlavacsek finds a meditative quality in much of the music, even in the outgoing "Etude" and "Auf fröhlicher Wanderschaft," more than a Romantic passion, although that is also present in "Sturmnacht," Ungeduld, and other of these works. The Ungarische Fantasie makes use of folk rhythms, but rather than a rhapsodic dance like other Hungarian Fantasies, it alternates slow contemplative sections with faster showier ones in a mesmerizing way. Hlavacsek is a superbly sensitive player who seems to be entirely in control of and yet easily comfortable with the changeability of the music. Klage has soft, almost feathery, passages, but also direct statements, which Hlavacsek makes powerful without harshness. The pieces here are all late works, according to the notes, and since this is labeled "Vol. 1," it raises the question "Is Goldmark's earlier piano music not as good?" Let's hope not, because Hlavacsek's performance and the interesting qualities of Goldmark's music make this intriguing listening.
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