For exhaustive thoroughness and scholarship alone, Leslie Howard’s comprehensive cycle of Liszt’s piano works deserves landmark status in the annals of recorded history. Many of the performances, however, reveal a pianist who has bitten off more music than his fingers can properly “chew”, let alone “digest”. The fifth installment of Liszt at the Opera is a case in point. While it’s good to have a generous helping of rare Liszt operatic paraphrases, Howard’s dutiful sobriety lacks the wit, sparkle, and fantasy needed to make Liszt’s inspired bombast come alive. For example, we miss the crisp march rhythms Steven Mayer brings to the Grande fantaisie sur des thèmes de l’opéra Niobe (which Liszt played at his famous “duel” against Thalberg). Similarly, Howard’s plodding gait throughout Réminiscences des Huguenots (in its first version) falls short of Arnaldo Cohen’s high voltage rendition of the revision (Naxos). Liszt’s straightforward “de-orchestration” of Rossini’s William Tell Overture is all but impossible to play, and sounds it. Howard summons up the prerequisite dynamism, though, for the delightful Tarantelle di bravura from Auber’s La Muette de Portici, but projects less fun then Gyorgy Cziffra’s and Earl Wild’s respective versions. There’s plenty of material here to tempt the devout pianophile, but Howard’s hit-and-miss pianism frustrates more than it illuminates. The recording quality is excellent, and Howard’s notes, of course, are erudite and entertaining.
