Ingrid Fliter Performs.
- Chopin: Piano Concertos
Chopin:
- Piano Concerto No. 1 in E minor, Op. 11
- Piano Concerto No. 2 in F minor, Op. 21
Accompanied by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Jun Märkl conducting
Frederic Chopin wrote his Piano Concerto No. 1 in 1830, and he described the second movement of this concerto as “reviving in one’s soul beautiful memories.” In Chopin’s case, he composed the piece when he was about nineteen and impressed with a beautiful young student, Constantia Gladkowska, at the Warsaw Conservatory.
Chopin’s music is all so lyrical and emotional; like most other folks, I love his music.
Of course, the piano parts dominate both piano concertos, in order to showcase Chopin’s own virtuosity on the instrument. Yet with the Piano Concerto No. 1, the piano doesn’t even get a chance to play until after a lengthy orchestral introduction.
While I liked Ms. Fliter’s playing a lot, I was somewhat disappointed with the accompanying orchestra. At times I found their entrances a bit rough and harsh, opposed to being lyrical.
After the lengthy introduction, Ms. Fliter’s piano sounds finally appear, and then the orchestra properly gets into the background.
Ms. Fliter was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and she has become a specialist in Chopin, having already released two well-received Chopin albums before this one, and winning the Silver Medal in 2000 at the International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw.
Ms. Fliter plays the first movement of the Concerto #1 in a sensitive, rhapsodic interpretation that I enjoyed a lot.
In the slow movement, Ms. Fliter is also delicately lyrical, and her expressive playing emphasizes the music’s nuances and color.
In the Piano Concerto No. 2 in F minor Ms. Fliter brings a comparable degree of sensitive playing as she did to No. 1. Although she doesn’t have as many memorable melodies to play, she connected with me, nonetheless, with the compelling sweetness of her performance.
The Guardian, 28th February 2014, wrote the following:
“There’s nothing small-scale about Fliter’s performances. This is very much Chopin playing in the great tradition: rich-toned, generous though never profligate with its rubato, and invested with a vast range of keyboard colour. It’s all put together meticulously too” .
Here is Ingrid Fliter in Chopin Piano Concerto number 2:
And next, here she is in the POLONAISE in F# minor by Frederic Chopin:
Finally, here is Ms. Fliter, talking about and also playing small extracts from this CD:
Tags: Ingrid Fliter, Chopin, Concerto 1, Concerto 2, Scottish Camber Orchestra, Jun Märkl
