With their undeniable charm and modest technical demands, Schubert’s waltzes must have delighted amateur pianists who played them at home back in the days when the piano served as the family’s trusty home-entertainment center. It sounds as if pianist Giampaolo Muntoni went through all 99 waltzes in this collection more or less at sight. All the notes are there, but Muntoni’s generally stiff phrasing, lack of suppleness and point, limited dynamic range, sloppy pedaling at times, and blandness of character wear thin. Once in a while Muntoni comes up with a sensitively shaded performance (D. 779 No. 21, for instance), but that is the exception rather than the rule. A disc to avoid. [5/2/2006]
