The selection of Rachmaninov Preludes and Op. 3 No. 1 Elegy stem from 2010 studio sessions. If Vladimir Feltsman’s performances do not palpitate with dramatic underpinnings and scintillating display, they nevertheless remain the work of a seasoned and intelligent pianist.
Repeated hearings draw you into the unusually expansive yet beautifully sustained Op. 32 No. 5 main theme, or Op. 23 No. 4’s straightforward demeanor and tautly shaped polyphony. At first the whirling textures in Op. 23 No. 7 and Op. 32 No. 12 seem understated, but the climaxes prove to be carefully organized. The Elegy also reveals this pianist’s relaxed classicism at its best.
Similar observations characterize Feltsman’s account of the Third Concerto featuring the Russian National Symphony Orchestra conducted by Mikhail Pletnev. Originally released on the Triton label and long out-of-print, the performance took place at a 1992 Moscow Conservatory concert held in memory of Jacob Flier, with whom both Feltsman and Pletnev studied.
The resonant ambience results in diffuse and sometimes vague balances, where either climaxes lose definition or solo instruments protrude from out of nowhere, but at least you always notice the timpani part! Still, the sonics are an improvement over the relatively constricted sound in the live and more loosely-knit 1988 traversal with Zubin Mehta and the Israel Philharmonic issued by CBS Masterworks. In both recordings, incidentally, Feltsman opts for the lighter first-movement cadenza with the two-bar incision Horowitz observed, plus the once-common third-movement cut from two bars after rehearsal number 52 up to rehearsal number 54. Chiefly worth it for the solo works.