Given his two highly distinctive recordings of the Rachmaninov Third Concerto, Santiago Rodriguez serves up a surprisingly disappointing Second. The pianist underplays the music’s sweeping gestures while taking a gingerly trek across Rachmaninov’s swirling passagework. A relaxed, lyrical attitude à la Cliburn, Moiseiwitsch, and Ashkenazy is one thing; lack of vitality is another. In a similar vein, Rodriguez soft-pedals (no pun intended) the Chopin F minor Concerto’s bel canto influences, gliding through the aching, declamatory outbursts with blinders on, so to speak. Even with Stephen Gunzenhauser’s fine support, abetted by the competent Berliner Symphoniker, Rodriguez seems to have checked his scintillating instincts at the studio door en route to note-perfect yet small-scaled perfection. Perhaps this cultivated, individual pianist was having an off day.
