BACK TO BACH
KENNETH HAMILTON, Piano
Prima Facie CD061 / *****
When
pianophiles talk about hyphenated Bach, they are referring to Johann Sebastian
Bach's music in arrangements or transcriptions specifically for the piano by
later composers. Thus Bach-Busoni is not a person, but describes the authorship
of Bach's music as transcribed by the Italian piano virtuoso and scholar
Ferruccio Busoni (1866-1924).
This
excellent album of “Tributes and Transcriptions” celebrates the cult of Bach,
the most famous transcription being Busoni's take on the Chaconne in D
minor, an elaborately dressed-up gothic edifice which has occasionally overshadowed
the original for solo violin. Rachmaninov's transcription of three movements – Prelude,
Gavotte and Gigue – from Violin Partita No.3
is so romanticised that the original sounds strangely quaint.
The
four letters that make up the surname Bach (B flat-A-C-B natural) has a life of
its own in the Fantasia And
Fugue On B-A-C-H by Franz Liszt, a
show of imperious pianism which is mirrored in even more monumental Variations
On Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen, Zagen, also by
Liszt.
In between are Busoni's lovely chorale prelude transcriptions,
miniatures by comparison. Scottish pianist Kenneth Hamilton's authoritative but
persuasive playing is accompanied by his own insightful and witty programme
notes which make this a complete package one would regularly return to.
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