There is no questioning Xiayin Wang’s keyboard prowess, nor her ability to navigate the pianistic intricacies of Granados’ Goyescas to world-class standards. But is she truly attuned to this composer’s sound world? The exuberant opening Los requiebros, for example, abounds with indications regarding expression, dynamics, and pacing. All too often, Wang glides across the music’s surface, seemingly unaware of the harmonic and contrapuntal felicities below. Moreover, Wang’s overly fast tempo barely allows the composer’s embellishments to speak with the kind of rhythmic snap distinguishing Alicia de Larrocha’s four recorded versions. Nor does she impart comparable color and dimension to the music’s textural webs, as Jose Menor’s recent recording does so brilliantly.
Wang plays Coloquio en la reja, duo de amor sensitively and eloquently. However, the third piece’s basic pulse emerges more in the manner of a Moszkowski Spanish Dance than an earthy Fandango, on account of Wang’s slightly square phrasing and seeming reluctance to give in to the crescendos and just let the melodies soar. The pianist’s intimate style better suits the Maiden and the Nightingale’s lyricism, highlighted by her amazingly agile final cadenza.
Yet, again, the tempo directives underlining key harmonic points go for nothing. In Wang’s hands, El amor y la muerte clocks in at just under 11 minutes, about two to three minutes faster than the norm, due less to speed than to the pianist’s sidestepping many of the marked rallentandos. Again, Wang’s execution is awesomely proficient, yet the music’s abrupt emotional swings and allusions to previous movements seem to unfold on the same level. She captures the final movement’s alluring shade and light, but little of its “misterioso” mood, while yet again ignoring Granados’ requests for “poco più lento”, “sotto voce”, and so forth. Her reading frankly pales next to Jose Menor’s prodigious textural diversity, sharp characterizations, and dramatic intensity.
By contrast, Wang’s surface grace and charm better suit the more modest interpretive demands of the shorter works included as couplings. In particular, the Valses poéticos abound with deliciously pointed up phrases, such as in the Vivo’s high-register, music box-like descending runs, or the Allegretto’s ever-so-slightly delayed second beats. And I’ve rarely heard such a nimble and effortless account of the frothy, arguably overlong Allegro de concierto. In short, Wang is ideal when it comes to Granados’ lighter side, but our reference Goyescas versions dig idiomatically deeper.
