Word: scherzo
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After such a physically and emotionally draining movement, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and its conductor alike seemed to rejoice in the relaxed, waltz-like pace of the gargantuan Scherzo. The introduction of bells and intricate spiccato/pizzicato sections augmented the diversity of texture in the third movement, whose screaming finale prompted Gatti to take a handkerchief from his packet and wipe his cheek before proceeding into the final two movements of Mahler's fifth symphony...
...lacking in his fabled lyricism. With no prizes left to win and therefore little left to prove, the aging artist had no incentive to subsume beauty of tone to mere bravura. His performance of the Berceuse in D flat, nestled between the two Ballades and the muscular Op. 39 Scherzo, was a pearl--though he glided so rapidly through the right-hand runs that it didn't end up sounding all that much like a cradle song. Like the rest of the program, this piece benefited from the pianist's indescribably intense dynamic control...
Some critics fault Pollini's recent traversal of the Beethoven sonatas as too mannered and conventional. This is doubtless unfair, but it came to mind during Pollini's starkly Olympian, unsmiling performance of the Scherzo. I think his motives are simply misunderstood: his "straight-act" approach seeks to rescue great works from the vainglorious fireworks of unprincipled wunderkinden. He is in every way a musical aristocrat...
...conductor, since the Mozart offered him a chance to think like the concertmaster he used to be. The strings were together and the winds were together. If Laredo's choice of tempi was often less than daring, he made up for it by successfully turning the minuet into a scherzo. He seemed to want the fourth movement to sound like Mendelssohn's "Italian" symphony, with pleasing results...
...Sonata's Adagio espressivo certainly captured a more intimate feeling, but the playing was emotionally unremarkable. The high point of the Beethoven came in the Scherzo. where Buswell's devil-may-care boldness struck a wonderful contrast to Levinson's filigreed lines. Here, the interplay of the instruments finally reached the same heights it had achieved in the Bartok...