Rebecca Penneys’ previous Fleur de Son Classics release (Recital Gems from Chautauqua–see review by typing Q6075 in Search Reviews) offered a memorable, intelligently conceived program that contrasted to the willful, anarchic quality of her earlier solo Chopin and Brahms discs. As it happens, this September, 2003 recital held at the Eastman School of Music (where Penneys teaches) is a hit-and-miss affair. If you attempted to notate Chopin’s G minor Ballade as Penneys plays it, the score would look quite different from what the composer wrote in terms of dynamics and tempo. The performance bears little sense of a basic pulse, which is not the case in regard to the rhythmic freedom that Hofmann, Cortot, and Horowitz display in the same work. A small group of Grieg’s Lyric Pieces better withstand Penneys’ delight in speeding up and slowing down (her skittish sprint through “Butterfly” is an aural treat).
In Debussy’s Images Book I, the manic subjectivity she imposes upon Reflets dans l’eau yields uneven articulation for some of the right-hand arpeggiated jetsprays. Her rapid-transit pace for Mouvement sometimes forces her to slam on the brakes to regroup her fingers, consequently compromising the music’s churning momentum. But she makes a calmer, steadier impression in Hommage à Rameau.
If not for the arch diminuendos and holdbacks that Penneys sprinkles into the Rondo Alla Turca, I’d comfortably recommend her Mozart K. 331 sonata. Although Penneys pulls the opening section in Liszt’s Vallée d’Obermann out and about, she somehow maintains the music’s narrative flow by phrasing the descending motives over the bar line. However, little shape and dramatic sweep emerge from the pianist’s ritarding phrase endings and lurching basic pulse throughout the remainder of the piece. As a result, her tremolos and octaves fall flat next to Berman’s radiant glitter, Horowitz’s white-hot intensity, or Arrau’s full-bodied majesty. In all, chalk this up to a recital by an utterly natural pianist with a penchant for blurring the tiny boundary that separates unfettered inspiration and flaky musicianship.
