Hot on the heels of Bridge’s release featuring Lambert Orkis in Beethoven’s Appassionata on period and modern instruments come back-to-back Diabelli Variations with Edmund Battersby: one performed on a replica of an 1824 Graf pianoforte, the other on a New York Steinway Grand ca. 1976. Both interpretations are clean, conscientious, and characterized by a stylish reserve that sometimes reminds me of Stephen Kovacevich’s 1969 Philips recording. However, differences in detail are palpable. The Graf fortepiano boasts sharp registral differentiation and tactile immediacy, made all the more alluring by Battersby’s effective use of blurred pedalings that would sound sloppy on a modern piano. Bass lines convey a pungent, bassoon-like bite (notice the unusual melodic clarity binding Variation 16’s relentless broken octaves) while the twangy sonority Battersby achieves in long sustained chords (the Andante Variation 20, for example) intensifies the music’s harmonic surprises.
On the other hand, certain variations come off better on the newer instrument: compare Variation 13’s sluggishly dispatched dotted rhythms on the Graf to Battersby’s more incisive execution on the Steinway. This also holds true for Variations 15 and 22. Both interpretations treat the poignant and achingly expressive minor-key variations toward the end in a dry, matter-of-fact manner. You can’t help but admire and respect Battersby’s serious musicianship and integrity, even if pianists as disparate as Arrau, Mustonen, Schnabel, Serkin father and son, Frith, and the aforementioned Kovacevich access the music’s kinetic energy, gruff humor, and large-scale drama with more consistent and individualized results.
