Johann Sebastian Bach - Piano Transcriptions Vol. 2 - Ferruccio Busoni (Nikolai Demidenko)

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Composer: Johann Sebastian Bach

1. Fantasia (Movement 1 of Fantasia in C minor, BWV 906) (arr. Ferruccio Busoni)
2. Adagio in G major, BWV 968 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni)
3. Fugue (Movement 2 of Fantasia in C minor, BWV 906) (arr. Ferruccio Busoni)
4. Komm, Gott Schöpfer, Heiliger Geist, BWV 667 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni)
5. Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 645 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni)
6. Little Prelude and Fugue in E minor, BWV 533 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni): Prelude
7. Little Prelude and Fugue in E minor, BWV 533 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni): Fugue
8. Prelude and Fugue in D major, BWV 532 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni): Prelude
9. Prelude and Fugue in D major, BWV 532 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni): Fugue
10. Herr Gott, nun schleuss den Himmel auf, BWV 617 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni)
11. Durch Adams Fall ist ganz verderbt, BWV 637/705 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni)
12. In dir ist Freude, BWV 615 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni)
13. Jesus Christus, unser Heiland, BWV 665 (arr. Ferruccio Busoni)
14. Ciaccona (Movement 5 of Partita No. 2 in D minor, BWV 1004) (arr. Ferruccio Busoni)

Nikolai Demidenko, piano
Date: 2002
Label: Hyperion
http://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA67324

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Review

ARTISTIC QUALITY: 9 / SOUND QUALITY: 9

Nikolai Demidenko’s large-scale pianism suits Busoni’s Bach transcriptions to a tee. Listen first to the E minor prelude; you sense that Demidenko truly revels in the music’s declamatory syntax and booming bass lines. Part of this may have to do with the pianist’s Fazioli concert grand, whose resonance cuts like a saber wrapped in a velvet cloak. Demidenko sculpts fluid paragraphs out of the D major fugue’s superficially repetitious sequences, and takes the hybrid Fantasia, Adagio, and Fugue at a brisk, vehement clip. The pianist forges an effortless link between the unfinished fugue’s last measures and Busoni’s unmistakably crabbed conclusion.

By contrast, Durch Adam’s Fall ist ganz verderbt is given a broader than usual yet compellingly sustained treatment. In Wachet Auf, Demidenko succeeds better than most in projecting the middle-voice chorale tune in consistent proportion to Bach’s upper and lower lines. Oddly, the D minor Chaconne transcription proves to be the recital’s sole dud. Demidenko fusses around with agogics and tempo fluctuation to the point where the music’s unity and cumulative power fall by the wayside. If you want a freewheeling Bach/Busoni Chaconne, Evgeny Kissin delivers the goods with a more unbuttoned, scintillating kind of virtuosity. Excellent, historically informative notes by Charles Hopkins complement Hyperion’s top-notch engineering.

-- Jed Distler, ClassicsToday

More reviews:
BBC Music Magazine  PERFORMANCE: **** / SOUND: *****
http://www.classical.net/music/recs/reviews/h/hyp67324a.php
https://www.amazon.com/Bach-Piano-Transcriptions-No-2/dp/B00005Y0N7
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Bach-Busoni-Transcriptions-2-Nicolai-Demidenko/dp/B00005Y0N7

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Johann Sebastian Bach (31 March [O.S. 21 March] 1685 – 28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the Baroque period. Bach enriched established German styles through his mastery of counterpoint, harmonic and motivic organisation, and his adaptation of rhythms, forms, and textures from Italy and France. He is known for instrumental compositions such as the Brandenburg Concertos and the Goldberg Variations, and vocal music such as the St Matthew Passion and the Mass in B minor. Since the 19th-century Bach Revival he has been generally regarded as one of the greatest composers of all time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Sebastian_Bach

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Nikolai Demidenko (born July 1, 1955, Aniskino) is a Soviet-Russian-born classical pianist. Demidenko studied at the Moscow Gnessin School with Anna Kantor and at the Moscow Conservatoire under Dmitri Bashkirov. In addition to a vast amount of the standard Germanic and Russian repertory, he is a specialist of Frédéric Chopin and a noted champion of the works of neglected composers, such as Carl Maria von Weber and Nikolai Medtner, as well as neglected works of well-known composers. Demidenko has been a resident in the UK since 1990, and won a Gramophone Award in 1992.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolai_Demidenko

http://www.demidenko.net/

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