Nadia Reisenberg (1904-1983), 立陶宛裔美籍钢琴家,Josef Hofmann的弟子。 Nadia Reisenberg was born in Vilnius in 1904.She studied in St Petersburg with Leonid Nikolaev, who also taughtShostakovich, before leaving around the time of the Revolution, eventuallymaking her way to New York. There she studied with the Liszt student AlexanderLambert and later with Josef Hofmann. Concert soloist, recitalist and teacherReisenberg died in 1983. Ivory Classics have here reissued her threeWestminster LPs, originally recorded between 1955-58 and devoted to her Haydnreadings. They were made before the Christa Landon edition was published so theeditions used were of their time. Nevertheless these are tremendouslycompelling examples of superior pianism � and not simply Haydn pianism. Her impulse toward precise articulationmeans that you will find few examples of exaggeration, either in matters oftempo or dynamics. The last emerges as perfectly natural and not at allmechanically constricted. She is a romanticist, certainly, but an astute one.Her first movements tend to be energetic but elegant, her slow movements vestedwith real expressivity, her finales full of verve. Indeed in almost allperformances one finds examples of a consummately lyrical but immaculatelyaware mind at work. Thus for example one can admire the genialleft hand pointing in theMinuetof the G major Sonata or the beautifuldiminuendi she makes in the repeated phrases of that sonata抯Adagio. She can be robust, as in theFantasiainC major, and she can charm � listen to the opening movement of the Eflat major sonata. Her fingerwork in theAdagiois a well nigh perfectinstrument for conveying sensitive lines, her communicative generosity reachingan apogee in the same work抯Prestofinale, the line kept constantly andinvigoratingly alive. She doesn抰 overplay the etched humour of the finale of the D majorsonata preferring instead to infer than to parade. The contrasts she makesbetween forte passages in the opening movement of one of the most impressive ofthe sonatas, the E minor, No 53 is consistently illuminating. And if the slowmovement seems somewhat under inflected here it is nevertheless sensitive. Thefinale is certainly full of the most delicious voicings, rippling left hand,filigree right, marvellously alive and inventive. The sense of just momentumgenerated internally, as it were, is evident in theRondofinale of the Aflat sonata in which the melodic curve is splendidly delineated. Her trills inthe E flat majorAriettaconVariazioniare perfectly weighted and sheabjures over-sentimentalising here and elsewhere. Her pointing is superb and intheAllegroof the C major sonata, No 60, she can run from felicitoustreble to a stuttering bombastic bass without cocking an eyebrow or turning ahair. And so in the finale she can turn her hand to a fine and sturdyAllegro,running the gamut of technical flourishes with utter security. All in all I would be strongly tempted torecommend this Ivory Classics double to those yet to be smitten by Haydn抯 piano music. Irrespective of the year ofpublication of these discs, irrespective of the edition used, these enlivening,elucidatory and generous performances resound down nearly fifty years ofrecorded history; they were something of a revelation to me and earn an earlyplace in my Record of the Year selection. Jonathan Woolf
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