Ivo Pogorelich's early performances showcased an extraordinary level of interpretation freedom and flawless technique. The sheer liberty in his playing has the power to transport you to a different realm.
I heard this live in 1991. It shocked both me and my teacher, who was also performing this sonata in public. He said: “everything of that sonata was played: every single note and every single emotion!”.
I saw him in Caracas, Venezuela, in 1990. I was shocked and bewitched forever. This recording reminds me of what I listened to at the Teresa Carreno Cultural Complex main concert hall. It was a sound that came from the bottom of a pianist's soul, not just from an instrument, not just from his moving fingers. I don't know anyone today even close to producing this "otherworldly" effect. Technical pyrotechnics and bodily contortions won't do.
Wow. What you say here ! I think Pogo is very unique and Argerich felt this perhaps . He is misunderstood and I dont get him.. His Scarlatti is the most perfect ever "recorded" I don't believe anyone can really do what he does on his recorc. I bought the dvd too .I believe its mostly studio tinkering Horowitz and Michelangeli of all people dont make piano sound like that ! His mind and needs come from somewhere else .
@@MrInterestingthings I couldn’t agree more when you say his mind comes from somewhere else. That’s exactly my impression, till today, even since I saw his photograph in black-and-white in the newspaper, announcing his upcoming recital.
I was at this concert. Pogorelich was the first pianist of the younger generation who I felt was a master of the piano in the same way as Horowitz & Richter. Pogo was able to mold melody at fortissimo and pianissimo. His tone was glorious like Horowitz's. In this he was different than many of the new breed of pianists. They can play the piano--(Lang Lang, Volodos, Sokolov(saw his debut in NY), Trifonov, Sultanov etc. You know who I mean). But none of them gets into a piece at the depth of Pogo. I love how Pogo has investigated the slow tempo (Like Richter)...the slower the better--and always that tone floating over the music and creating the perfect milieu for the music to survive in. Horowitz and Richter do this...not to mention Rubenstein and Hofmann.
How can you give such high praise to a performance with so many mistakes? Sounds like the performer was constantly trying to play at an intensity beyond his limit to perform consistently. What metric do you use to judge a pianist other than the number of mistakes they make?
@@aidenbielefeld5005 I don't think you listen to Scriabin very much. Listen to this. Zhukov is out of Pogorelich's league when it comes to Scriabin. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ZSLhcdgLHHw.htmlsi=7QOIdOTyc3LdyppS
@@aidenbielefeld5005 I don't think you listen to Scriabin very much. Listen to this. Zhukov is out of Pogorelich's league when it comes to Scriabin. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ZSLhcdgLHHw.htmlsi=Iqh6ZRvscS8jm8Ls ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Outd1v_b9tQ.htmlsi=E08BwBAn3WQQ59m5
@@aidenbielefeld5005 I don't know why my replies aren't going through. Sorry if I accidentally send multiple. Here is my intended reply: I don't think you listen to Scriabin very much. Scriabin performance does not receive enough criticism because it is not as popular as performance of other composers. There are multiple recordings which are actually performed to high standards unlike this one. Here is a good one. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-DexWwfahReY.html
I love that at the first part he plays it slower then most pianists do, he makes teh atmosfere so perfect for this piece. And the climax at the end is just pure music, its pure,
Sofronitsky, easily, almost in every his recording, with a quality of 90% worse than Pogorelich and others. come on, smartasses, listened to 3 videos in youtube and already some to the front with wise reports
So enormously pronounced! Everything is there from the softness in the dreamy and debussyesque beginning to the sheer rumbling force later on and even the sparkles on top. And most astoundingly it still captures the spontaneity of Scriabin. A truely monumental performance!
One of the most beautiful pieces of music ever written. I must admit that I prefer Pletnev’s interpretation overall, but the power that emanates from Pogorelich’s playing is undeniably gorgeous, especially in the coda of the second movement.
This is how I would like to sound playing this piece. My favorite of all the Scriabin sonatas. And I actually learned it and played it in senior recital in 2016 but didn't sound near this way!
Un sogno!!! What a maturity in the first movement, every voice sings and the form remains compact. About the second movement there is nothing to say. It is just acrobatic!!!
Pogorelich is great in this interpretation of this beautiful sonata, absolutely my favourite recording like other many other pieces played by him, it's a pity he didn't make new recordings for many years!
Gilels is great of course too. And Pogorelich just signed a contract with Sony, and said that his first album will include a piece by Rachmaninoff. My guess is either the 2nd Sonata or Moments Musicaux.
@@braedonkirkpatrick2143 It's not that good, alas. Does in no way match his previous recordings, ALL his previous recordings (and the sound quality is just... well: Sony). And dawg knows I love Pogorelich...
@@Pogouldangeliwitz I think the second movement is interesting, but the first and third just don't work in his new style. What's wrong with the audio quality? I didn't hear anything particularly painful.
Sin duda una de las mejores grabaciones existentes de Ivo Pogorelich. Nos muestra como pocos a la vez los detalles y la estructura de esta obra maestra. Para muestra un botón: 5:55 pocas veces se ha escuchado el tema principal con tal claridad en ese pasaje!!!
@Tough Love You are looking at this the wrong way. The dynamics are just different, and in my opinion, Ivos dynamics are perfekt. In the end, everything is subjective
This is i think one of the most beautifull pieces of human art that has ever been composed, and hwo Pogorelich plays its makes me almsot go intot eh exstacy Scriabin wanted his listeners and himself to be in.
Great, just great. It is truth every single note can be heard. It is a distinctive and powerful rendition. It is my favorite Scriabin piano Sonata and he does a gorgeous interpretation. He should have recorded the Fantasy Opus 28. It maybe slower too, a bit, maybe in the whole beginning, but he gets a so nice sound that it is a pleasure to recreate in it note after note. Find he is, once again, very good. He manages to develop the increasing tension leading to the end as it must be done. Can't tell if he's a genius, as Argerich said, but quite often he is close to the concept. ❤️💎👌👍
@@edwindepianist Yes, I agree. His tone pitch is unique, his sound one of the best I've ever heard. He has done some master recordings, as his Scarlatti and his Ravel. Pogorelich is a very interesting, different and personal pianist. Don't know for others, but for me to have or get a beautiful tone, a peculiar sound, is something very important in a pianist. And he has it. This does not happen with all. The holy trinity in piano, let's say Gould, Richter and Argerich, doesn't have a so appealing piano sound. Am fed up of topics. One has to demitify. These iconic piano gods can also be criticised. For instance, Gould can be as quirky or more than Pogorelich, we just have to hear his Mozart. Richter can be and sound monotonous, uninspired and so, boring, even. His piano has a sort of deaf or remote sound, always. And he was as irregular as Pogo may have been. And about Argerich, she is sometimes too fast and find lacks poetry or romanticism now and then. Not everything in piano consist in trying to sound passionate or energetic. We have to go beyond topics. E. G. Am not a big fan of Benedetti, although I recognise he tried to be quite perfect. And I dislike Horowitz (exaggerated and effectist), Pollini (cold and technical), Brendel (too many flaws, don't know if he was as much as a fake value, as once or twice stated), and deeply dislike Barenboim (know some unknown pianists that sound and play (?) equal or better than him: mediocrity, as sometimes said?). Think true anyway that Barenboim has a "plain", poor piano sound. Just an opinion. Am I being cheeky or too bold to say this? Is it a sin? Excuses to these ones and their followers for saying, anycase. Of course the Gould Goldberg Variations (last recording) are excellent. For sure Richter's Rach 2 remains possibly the best. No doubt about Argerich Ravel's concert as great. Her Rach 3 also outstands. No doubt neither about Benedetti's Debussy. Rubinstein was nice, but his technique was not flawless, as said, too. Still they are icons for some reasons. But about the rest I've mentioned.. my pianists are others. Sin or not, it's what I think. Pogorelich instead, for me, is one of the best pianists of the past and present century, and think this is out of doubt. 🙄🤔😔🙏
It's certainly the most exuberant I've heard, though I wish the sound wasn't so clangorous. Ashkenazy is stiil my go to for this piece. His is perhaps the 2nd most exuberant I've heard, yet he sounds a bit more controlled. I do place highly Pogorelich's Scriabin op 8 no 2, and op 32 no 1. His Scriabin Sonata 2 for me ranks behind many others including, in no particular order, Askenazy, Lewin, Fiorentino, Demidenko, Sofronitsky, Fergus-Thompson, Richter, Zaritskaya, and Lisitsa. I haven't kept up with any new performances on youtube for the last 5 yrs or so.
Fergus-Thompson ! Demidenko forever! Sofronitsky will become a travelling shrine before it's over .As exciting as Horowitz in concert .Lewin deserves more attention .I really need to listen carefully to Fiorentino .
@@MrInterestingthings The Fiorentino version of Sonata 2 which I refer is not the version currently on youtube, unless the overy amplified volume has obscured some details and tricked my ears. The version I refer to appeared on the Appian label, was also live as is the version on RU-vid, and featured a pairing of the Rachmaninov 2nd Sonata, and the Prokofiev 8th. I see that there is currently 1 new and 2 used copies available on Amazon. The version on RU-vid is nevertheless still well above average. Fiorentino ranks in the top 6 of those I named, along with Lewin (a similarly faster paced reading), Richter and Zaritskaya (both slower paced), and Ashkenazy and Sofronitsky (both mid paced). I'm referring only to the 1st mvt of Sonata 2. In the 2nd mvt I only fancy two performances, my 1st choice being Ashkenazy, with Demidenko a close 2nd.
Delirium and fury ..... I think Scriabin could have liked it .... and this is incredible how this Sonata can motivate great pianists : Sofronitzky (for me untouchable) , Feinberg, Wang, Pogorelich the mad .... bravo Mr. Scriabin !
@@Pogouldangeliwitz Ok, I know what you mean. But listen really to Mrs. Wang's Second Sonata, for example. Forget the marketing packaging of the pseudo-icon, and listen to the girl. First, she suffers under hysteria. Than, comes exhibitionnism. And, not the worst part of it, as a lesbian, she has real sexuality. I think, this is is enough to play Scriabin correctly. And even better than "correctly".
@@Fritz_Maisenbacher So you need to be a hysterical exhibitionist lesbian to play Scriabin "correctly". Aha. Might explain Horowitz' stunning success with this composer. 😉
@@Pogouldangeliwitz No problem. Horowitz was heavy depressive. Homosexual, but never with a "coming out". And married to a female creature who was controlling him through a sadistic authority. He interrupted his career for years. Alcohol and strong drugs. Even in his latest years. Look at the Tokyo concert, you will see a poor man ......
It's a very powerful performance. First movement slow and very intense, the second movement doesn't quite have the light, quirky dance-like mood that I associate with it, but Ivo's rendition is very interesting. His coda (climactic peroration based on the opening) is stunning.
This is one of the most heartbreaking piano sonata expositions, and soon turning into fury. What Ivo does here is ferocious, not just in terms of pianist technique terms, but also in his awareness of the rage Scriabin was living with at the time. The last movement of this is pure chaos, mayhem, rage, and maybe even absolution. None amongst us can ever truly hope for such a thing.
Although lacking in the ethereal, diaphanous qualities Scriabin's pianissimo textures require in the Prestissimo movement, the superhuman, Promethean energy throughout is just right, and make renditions just as Ashkenazi's and especially Hamelin's sound studentish and underwhelming.
Waves of light! Very admirable interpretation, but I didn't thoroughly enjoy it. Interpretations of Scriabin are often difficult to metabolize because of his curious and neurotic oscillations both in philosophy and in music between the overflowingly ecstatic and the breath-takinginly lightheaded. I feel Ivo is capturing both but in too explicitly. This piece to me suggests those incredibly intricate dynamics by itself and so I do prefer to listen to Mikhail Pletnev's rendition. Still, what a performance!
Performance eccezionale, però la registrazione un po' vecchia e di qualità non eccezionale aiuta a mettere in risalto i vari accenti molto interessanti.
I liked everything except where he played real loud. Also, he kept moving around like he had aunts in his pants. At about 2:30 the piano tuner sneaked out and started tuning the piano. IVO did a good job of covering it up, It was a fantastic performance but I really hated it,
I think he was crazy and insanely phenomenal pergaps with overlap before I was aware of these sensational , over wrought tendecies . Sometimes it seems interesting but this is wrong headed . This music should sound like refined , belle epoque almost decorative not monstrous like 15Wagnerites boiling inside a keyboard .All this smashing , percussive sounding here ! the experience is ... It aint Ashkenazy thats for sure or Gavrilov ! I dont even know as music what it is .Skryabin it ain't !
@@edwindepianist I didn't know Richter ever heard Pogo.I have Monsaingeon's film and book . Please tell me where u found this info. Richter doesn't often comment on other recent pianists .
@@HermanIngram Heavy handed my ass. I'll give u that his later style could be considered such, but early Pogorelich is extremely delicate, even with the melody. His movement one is unparalleled.
Meh, pletnev performance is pretty mediocre (I love pletnev, for example I adore his Dante sonata but his interpretation of the fourth sonata is just too distant and asettic). I recommend Stanislav Neuhaus and Lazar Bermann, the two best recordings of the sonata. Pogorelich and Feinberg contend for the third place. I forgot to mention Zhukov: he is also superb!
