| ||||||
 | | | ||||
 | ||
| | |
Stravinsky: The Firebird Suite Idil Biret, piano Special price Post-free to subscribers Reviewed by Ates Orga in Cornucopia 31
| ||||
 | ||||
| | | | |
Reviewed by Ates Orga in Cornucopia Issue 31 Stravinsky: The Firebird Idil Biret, piano Naxos 8.555999 Idil Biret, doyen of Turkey's postwar pianists, is the Naxos house artist prized for her complete Brahms, Chopin and Rachmaninov recordings. If her latest enterprise, Stravinsky's folk-inspired Firebird ballet (in the composer's own arrangement), lacks the immediacy and punch of the orchestral original, as well as its rich tapestry of colours, that's reductive transcription for you. The greatness of the music, though, remains intact, and the playing is authoritative. With its well-balanced Steinway piano, naturally recorded sound and sympathetic acoustic (St George's, Bristol), this is a release preferable to some of Biret's recent Beethoven recordings from Brussels (the sonatas) and Bilkent (the concertos, noisily 'live'), where imperfect production does not do justice to the performance.
| ||
| | |