MOMENTS MUSICAUX
ANTOINETTE PERRY, Piano
Navona Records NV6442 / TT: 77’30”
This album was taken from a 2014 live performance by American pianist Antoinette Perry at the University of Southern California’s Thornton School’s Newman Auditorium. It is essentially a collection of short pieces or “musical moments”, a term which Franz Schubert used for his six short pieces published in 1828. The term was also used by Serge Rachmaninov in 1896 for his six Op.16 short pieces, which are more complex and extended numbers than Schubert’s. Moments musicaux could also apply to short works in sets like Mendelssohn’s Songs Without Words, Grieg’s Lyric Pieces, Janacek’s On The Overgrown Path and their like.
Both Schubert and Rachmaninov’s sets of sixes were not performed in their entirety, but neither was there a need to as the selections were well chosen, exhibiting a variety of musical palettes. Schubert’s Musical Moment No.3 in F minor is the famous Hungarian-flavoured one, while Nos.5 and 6 are suitably contrasted, violence juxtaposed alongside a song-like sublimity. Perry’s choices of Rachmaninov’s Moments Musicaux Nos.1 (Slavic melancholy personified) and 4 (coruscating brilliance) were also excellent. These were preceded by the Russian’s well-known Prelude in G sharp minor Op.32 No.12, a wellspring of introspection.
Antoinette Perry
The recital’s second half is dominated by a single work: the 18 conjoined short pieces of Robert Schumann’s Davidsbündlertänze Op.6, which are also musical moments reflecting states of mind of the German composer’s alter-egos, impulsive Florestan versus reflective Eusebius. This receives a very coherent performance, filled with much lyricism, colour and nuance, and with close and loving attention paid to its various dance rhythms. Never a dull moment in its just over a half-hour duration.
There are two pieces of Americana, both delicious encores to close both halves of the recital, which could deservedly be called musical moments: Louis Moreau Gottschalk’s Souvenir de Puerto Rico: Marche des Gibaros and Gershwin’s I Got Rhythm. The recorded sound is vivid and other than applause and cheers, the audience is perfectly behaved. An enjoyable listen from start to finish.
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