Although not all of the works pianist Evgenia Rubinova includes on her EMI “fantasy” recital are fantasies in name, they certainly are in spirit. However, “fantasy” hardly figures in Rubinova’s interpretations; she tenuously toes that thin line between cut-and-dried and doggedly literal. One problem concerns how Rubinova underpedals to the point where musical lines lose their natural fluidity. For example, listen to the Chopin Fantasie’s opening section. Has this music ever sounded so dry, so literal-minded, so devoid of mystery or style? In other words, it lacks the very fantasy Rubinova wishes so badly to convey. The remainder unfolds with equal diffidence.
I’ll grant that Rubinova sustains interest throughout a lot of Kreisleriana by virtue of her penchant for bringing out different voices when material repeats. Yet the score rarely takes wing. It’s good that Rubinova goes out of her way to articulate No. 3’s triplets in the outer sections, but why bother if you can’t imbue them with urgency and direction? No. 7 is fast and notey, while No. 8 is muffled, emotionally detached, and about as spooky as a Czerny etude. If you’ve a taste for lobotomized Brahms, check out Rubinova’s dragging, drawn out Intermezzo Op. 117 No. 2. No. 5’s two-note phrases similarly plop and go nowhere. Fortunately, Rubinova comes alive in Nos. 6 and 7, and caps her inauspicious EMI debut with six memorable final minutes.
