Behold Lang Lang’s Sony Classical debut recital, recorded live in Vienna and available on DVD, in Blu-Ray format with special added 3-D performances, on high-grade LP vinyl, as a limited-edition CD set with 70-page hardcover booklet and bonus DVD promotional trailer, plus the plain old conventional audio-only two-CD set under review.
Conventional pretty much describes Lang Lang’s tasteful, slightly inhibited treatment of the first two movements of Beethoven’s C major Op. 2 No. 3 sonata. Everything is clean and in place, but I miss the music’s combative and tender extremes. Following a perky, crisply delineated Scherzo, Lang Lang launches into the Finale’s ascending triads with assurance and brio, only to slightly but noticeably hold back the tempo when the rapid scales kick in.
I suspect the pianist has lived longer with the “Appassionata”. He achieves a judicious mix of vibrancy, drama, and classicism in the outer movements, and unifies the central Andante con moto variations with controlled flexibility and breadth. I don’t care for his slight mooning over the first movement’s second subject, and wish that he had honored Beethoven’s dynamic extremes in the finale’s coda, but these are picky details.
Nitpicking proves Lang Lang’s undoing throughout Iberia Book I. Do his fussy overarticulations and contrived balances make inherent musical sense? On the other hand, similar rhetorical devices add appreciable orchestral heft and textural character to Prokofiev’s often played Seventh sonata, notably in the first movement’s central climax and in the finale’s asymmetric interplay. Not surprisingly, Lang Lang favors a curvaceous and romantically-tinged slow movement that couldn’t differ more from Pollini’s gaunter, steadier reserve, and he makes his conception work.
The first two Chopin encores bring out the mannered side of Lang Lang that his detractors love to hate: the Op. 25 No. 1 Etude’s swan-dive rubatos and the A-flat Polonaise’s sudden speed-ups and attention-getting accents, for example. However, right before the Polonaise main theme’s recapitulation, Lang Lang plays the G major interlude in a refreshingly terse way, with gorgeous pedal effects. His direct and extroverted account of the A-flat Waltz Op. 34 No. 1 makes for an uplifting closer.
In short, Lang Lang fans don’t need any prodding to purchase this release in whatever format suits their fancy. If only Sony had lavished the same red carpet treatment upon Volodos’ more artistically and pianistically interesting 2009 Vienna Recital (type Q12718 in Search Reviews).
