The pre-Bach keyboard composers featured in this program share an improvisatory sensibility and sense of playfulness that not only lend themselves to a modern concert grand but also can absorb Andrew Rangell’s freewheeling temperament and dynamic, big-boned pianism. His opening selection, Orlando Gibbons’ Lord of Salisbury Pavane and Galliard, conveys a three-dimensional, theatrical effect that completely differs from Glenn Gould’s x-ray clarity and astringent textures in the same work. Similarly, Rangell’s punchy accentuations in Sweelinck’s More palatino impart a greater sense of danger to the music’s inherent swagger, while the pianist’s inventive pedaling and tone coloring underline the extraordinary harmonic tension resulting from Thomas Tomkins’ cross-relations in A Sad Pavane for These Distracted Times.
It’s fascinating to hear Froberger’s Ricercare VI in C-sharp minor alongside the fugue that opens Beethoven’s Op. 131 string quartet in the same key. However, the concentration and assiduous momentum each work’s severe counterpoint engenders are completely undermined by Rangell’s overwrought phrasing. But if you really want vulgar, listen to how Rangell exaggerates voicings and distends phrases like a Russell Sherman “Mini-Me” throughout Bach’s sublime F minor Sinfonia. Ah, the things pianists must do to amass a cult following…
