The best performances in Eric Le Sage’s promising, albeit uneven two-CD Schumann release for RCA (never issued in the U.S.) augured well for the launch of a complete cycle for Alpha encompassing the composer’s complete solo and chamber works. As with 2007’s first volume, this second installment features two major large-scale solo compositions and a relative rarity.
Surely the Op. 5 Impromptus based on a theme by Schumann’s wife deserve more frequent airings, and Le Sage’s sensitively shaded interpretations make a cogent case for the music’s capricious lyrical qualities. For the F minor sonata Le Sage opts for the work’s five-movement form with two scherzos. Although Le Sage is not a great colorist per se, his impetuous, fearless sweep in the outer movements and in the second scherzo conveys both a sense of long line and ear-catching local details.
The Variations stand out for Le Sage’s ability to spin sexy legatos with little help from the sustain pedal–a trait that also marks Horowitz’s more personalized versions of the same movement. If I had to narrow the C major Fantasy’s interpretive parameters to a pair of archetypes, I’d place Pollini’s symphonic objectivity on one side and Kissin’s shoot-from-the-hip freedom on the other. Le Sage veers closer to the Kissin paradigm, speeding up at will here and there, exploring inner voices, or reassessing balances between hands to the point of occasional miscalculations where the accompaniment swamps the melody. While Schumann’s difficulties pose no problems for Le Sage’s well-groomed fingers (the Fantasy second movement’s effortless coda, for example), a little poise wouldn’t hurt. Loud passages take on a slightly brittle patina that’s at odds with the ambient warmth we usually hear in recordings made in Switzerland’s La Chaux-de-Fonds.
