These Schumann performances duplicate a release on the defunct Revelation label (RV 10012). Yedang’s slightly fuller remasterings cannot disguise the mediocre sonics–rather, they actually amplify sundry stage noises and thumping sounds. Yet they’re listenable enough for us to enjoy the Richter/Schumann alchemy in bewitching operation. For some reason Richter always played only six out of the eight Fantasiestücke (omitting “Grillen” and “Fabel”). His live May 10, 1970 performance retains the mesmerizing legato arcs and sustained introspection that characterize his mono studio DG traversal, although the incrementally proportioned rubatos in “Des Abends” and “Warum?” now stretch out to extremes that few other pianists can so convincingly sustain. “In der Nacht”‘s complex textural strands take greater wing, and if “Traumeswirren”‘s whirling outer sections occasionally teter over the speed limit, Richter’s fingers never fall off the steering wheel.
A more impulsive spirit drives Richter’s live January 22, 1972 Schumann Symphonic Etudes, in contrast to his steadier, tidier 1970 studio recording. As in the latter, Richter inserts the five posthumously published variations en masse between Etudes Five and Six. The October 10, 1976 Faschingsschwank aus Wien shares its considerable technical and stylistic virtues with a Helsinki performance from less than two months earlier (Music and Arts), but the pianist’s more incisive official live EMI recording from 1962 is the one to have. Unfortunately, Yedang provides just one access track for each composition, making it difficult to locate individual movements.
