Various Composers - Silver Age (Daniil Trifonov)

Information

Composer: Alexander Scriabin; Igor Stravinsky; Sergei Prokofiev

CD1:

• (01) Stravinsky - Serenade in A
• (05) Prokofiev - Sarcasms, Op. 17
• (10) Prokofiev - Piano Sonata No. 8 in B flat major, Op. 84
• (13) Prokofiev - 3 Pieces from "Cinderella", Op. 95: II. Gavotte
• (14) Stravinsky - The Firebird (transc. Guido Agosti)

CD2:

• (01) Prokofiev - Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op. 16
• (05) Stravinsky - 3 Movements from "Petrushka"
• (08) Scriabin - Piano Concerto in F sharp minor, Op. 20

Daniil Trifonov, piano

Mariinsky Theater Orchestra

Valery Gergiev, conductor

Date: 2020

Label: Deutsche Grammophon

https://www.deutschegrammophon.com/en/catalogue/products/silver-age-daniil-trifonov-11230

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Review

Daniil Trifonov rightly describes Russia’s Silver Age as ‘an increasingly fractured social, political and intellectual environment – a cocktail of different artistic expressions, in agitated interaction’. Even so, it’s a bit of a stretch to press Stravinsky’s 1925 Serenade into an era generally defined as having been broken off by the 1917 Revolution. And that stretch goes to breaking point with Prokofiev’s Eighth Sonata, composed in the 1940s. I suppose ‘Five Russian blockbusters and some interludes’, though more accurate, wouldn’t have the same ring to it.

Titles aside, these are two exceptional discs in many ways. The Scriabin Concerto seems to me particularly successful, because Trifonov has a fine instinct for its ebb and flow of moods and for just how much dreamy dalliance he can afford without tipping over into self-indulgence. Prokofiev’s monstrously demanding Second Concerto sees him completely in his element so far as hyper-virtuosity is concerned: I doubt whether the bustling, motoric second movement or the helter-skelter outer sections of the finale have been more daringly or excitingly driven, and if parts of the first and third movements feel reined in to the point of being laboured, there are (arguably) legitimate character-driven reasons for this approach.

With the Eighth Sonata I have more concerns. In general Trifonov has difficulty keeping his inner agitation in check. When the central phase of the first movement demands ruthless control of tempo he cannot resist pressing forwards, and while his finale is superbly virtuoso it risks confusing means with ends – the virtuosity should surely be in the service of a vision of the work as a wartime epic, as it is with Richter (who is admittedly hors concours). Even the Petrushka movements and Agosti’s Firebird transcription – consummately athletic though the playing undoubtedly is – occasionally see the music pressed into the service of Trifonov’s virtuosity, rather than the more truly virtuous vice versa. The cure for this would be to learn from orchestral performances not only as stimuli towards original pianistic colourings but also as models for continuity and dramatic pacing (see Pollini’s Petrushka for a shining example).

Trifonov’s nervous temperament comes more completely into its own in Prokofiev’s Sarcasms, which can not only stand but positively invite his highly capricious treatment. In Stravinsky’s Serenade, where Trifonov is roughly at the polar opposite to the composer’s own poker-faced recording, it could be argued that his bigger-boned first movement, his unscheduled precipitato at the end of the Rondoletto and his agitato rather than the marked teneramente in the finale Cadenza are not entirely at odds with the music.

Something of a mixed bag, then, with a big ‘wow!’ factor balanced by some moments of ‘whoa!’.

-- David Fanning, Gramophone

More reviews:
MusicWeb International  RECORDING OF THE MONTH

https://www.classical-music.com/reviews/concerto/silver-age-daniil-trifonov/

https://www.allmusic.com/album/silver-age-mw0003426801

https://www.audaud.com/silver-age-daniil-trifonov-deutsche-grammophon/

https://www.ft.com/content/c041f98b-d6f9-4c65-82c6-e8d498e26a73

https://www.limelightmagazine.com.au/reviews/daniil-trifonov-silver-age/

https://theclassicreview.com/album-reviews/review-silver-age-daniil-trifonov-plays-stravinsky-prokofiev-scriabin/

https://www.amazon.com/Silver-Age-CD-Daniil-Trifonov/dp/B08GLQVXW7

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Alexander Scriabin (6 January 1872 [O.S. 25 December 1871] – 27 April [O.S. 14 April] 1915) was a Russian composer and pianist. Scriabin was one of the most innovative and most controversial of early modern composers, and is considered by some to be the main Russian Symbolist composer. Independently of Arnold Schoenberg, Scriabin developed a substantially atonal and much more dissonant musical system. He was influenced by synesthesia, and associated colours with the various harmonic tones of his atonal scale. Scriabin had a major impact on the music world, and influenced composers such as Stravinsky and Prokofiev.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Scriabin

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Igor Stravinsky (17 June [O.S. 5 June] 1882 – 6 April 1971) was a Russian-born composer, pianist, and conductor. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential composers of the 20th century. Stravinsky's compositional career was notable for its stylistic diversity. He first achieved international fame with three ballets commissioned and first performed in Paris by Diaghilev's Ballets Russes: The Firebird (1910), Petrushka (1911) and the Rite of Spring (1913). Stravinsky's output is typically divided into three general style periods: a Russian period, a neoclassical period, and a serial period.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igor_Stravinsky

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Sergei Prokofiev (23 April, 1891–March 5, 1953) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor. As the creator of acknowledged masterpieces across numerous genres, he was one of the major composers of the 20th century. Prokofiev wrote seven completed operas, seven symphonies, eight ballets, five piano concertos, two violin concertos, a cello concerto, a symphony-concerto for cello and orchestra, and nine completed piano sonatas, many of which are widely known and heard. He also enjoyed personal and artistic support from a new generation of Russian performers, notably Sviatoslav Richter and Mstislav Rostropovich.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergei_Prokofiev

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Daniil Trifonov (born March 5, 1991 in Nizhny Novgorod) is a Russian concert pianist and composer. He studied with Tatiana Zelikman at Moscow’s famous Gnessin School of Music and with Sergei Babayan at the Cleveland Institute of Music. Trifonov won Third Prize at the 2010 Chopin Competition, First Prize at the 2011 Arthur Rubinstein Competition, and First Prize at the 2011 Tchaikovsky Competition. In February 2013 Trifonov made his debut at Carnegie Hall, New York, in a concert recorded by Deutsche Grammophon. As a composer, he premiered his Piano Concerto in E flat minor on 23 April 2014.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniil_Trifonov
http://daniiltrifonov.com/

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