Best known for her advocacy of Latin-American composers, Mirian Conti’s first project for the newly launched Steinway & Sons label is given over to Chopin’s complete Mazurkas. Fusing instinct and intellect, Conti clearly has thought these amazingly inventive and diverse pieces through insofar as tempos, tone color, voicings, and ornamentation are concerned. I’ll cite one cogent example: Conti begins the C-sharp minor Op. 33 No. 1’s unaccompanied modal melody in an unusually soft and offhanded manner. Once the left hand enters, the pianist increases intensity not so much in volume as by way of subtle legato phrasing, where notes seem to overlap by a split second, as if attempting to make the piano notes slide into each other in the manner of a singer. There’s plenty of zest and abandon in the giddy D-flat major second theme, yet it is tempered by Conti’s discrete pedaling and careful observance of Chopin’s often ignored rests. However, she catches you off guard with a few strategically placed bass-note sforzandos. Thousands of similarly fetching details abound throughout this release.
Notice Conti’s hushed approach to Op. 7 No. 1’s strange third theme, and how she peppers her conversational shaping of Op. 24 No. 2’s main theme with a slight yet stinging accent. Op. 59 No. 3’s lusty momentum and pronounced dynamic contrasts recall Martha Argerich’s similarly epic reading, while Op. 63 No. 3’s canonic voices manage to sound distinct from each other without any underlining on the pianist’s part. Conti’s aforementioned legato technique particularly stands out in two A minor Mazurkas–the Op. 17 No. 4 and the “Notre Temps” without opus number.
Conti provides program notes that delightfully interweave personal anecdotes and well-researched musical discussion. The engineering accurately reflects the generous, full-bodied sonority that Conti produces in concert, although the congested loud climaxes and slightly dry ambience typify what I suspect to be a large piano recorded in a small room.
