All three composers featured on Tatiana Nikolayeva's August 18, 1987 Salzburg Festival recital were central to this pianist's repertoire in concert and on disc. Once you accept the fact that her ideas about Bach pianism arose from late-19th/early-20th-century Romantic performance practices there's much to admire in the pianist's astute command of polyphony and sectionalized use of tone color. This helps impart a distinct character to each of the French Suite's movements, from the languid Allemand to the vigorous, assertive Gigue. Nikolayeva's phrasing of the exposition from the Musical Offering's 3-part Ricercare proves less studied and more direct than in her later, more refined studio traversal for Hyperion.

No significant differences mark the four Shostakovich Preludes and Fugues when compared to Nikolayeva's famous studio recordings from the same era (Melodiya/BMG 1987 and Hyperion 1990), although she shapes the E-flat minor Prelude's bleak tremolos with more urgency and dynamic build in front of an audience, while the D-flat Fugue's cross-rhythms are less-assuredly defined. She struggles a bit with the Op. 111 sonata's imposing runs, but she's fully attuned to the Arietta's otherworldly dimensions in the final pages (here, Orfeo's ample sonics markedly contrast to the clangorous, metallic engineering of her 1983 live Beethoven cycle, once available on the Olympia label). All told, this is not essential Nikolayeva, but her fans will be glad that this recital has been preserved.

--Jed Distler