Although Stravinsky composed at the piano and incorporated the instrument to brilliant effect in many orchestral works, he produced relatively little original solo piano music. Most of it is here, though the brilliant Op. 7 Etudes are conspicuous by their absence. Surely their difficulties pose no problems for Peter Hill, although his gingerly romp through the cruelly difficult Three Movements from Petrushka lacks the steel-edged abandon of Maurizio Pollini’s classic account. Hill’s meticulous cool and linear clarity, however, are just what the neo-classic Serenade in A, Les cinq doigts, and 1924 Sonata require. He calmly shakes the cubistic Piano Rag Music by its scruff, and his poker-faced way with the Tango (really a tango within a tango) allows the music’s half-hearted parody to fizzle out on its own terms. As with his seminal Second Viennese School recital for Naxos, Peter Hill’s piano is gorgeously reproduced. Warmly recommended, but make sure you have Pollini’s Petrushka on hand as well.
