The big news about this recording of Alkan’s mammoth Concerto for Solo Piano can be found on the front cover, below the work title. It reads: “First live recording.” If that doesn’t grab your attention, look at the back sleeve blurb: “totally live and unedited.” Still not sold? How about the front cover blurb: “Mark Latimer is the man who plays the Alkan Concerto for Solo Piano like a bat out of hell–AND FROM MEMORY!” And who’s Marc-André Hamelin? Chopped liver? To his credit, Mark Latimer has the technical wherewithal and stamina to get through this demanding 50-minute workout. Few pianists do. And few pianists today authorize the publication of their dirty linen in the form of wrong notes and other precarious moments that post-production surgery easily can correct (the first movement’s on-again, off-again repeated notes, for instance).
The problem is that Latimer takes to this big Alkanian highway with a bad case of Road Rage. He bangs away at the music like crazy, ignoring most of Alkan’s dynamic indications and accents, and generally treats the piano like a punching bag. Try to find a semblance of singing tone in the opera-tinged Adagio: it’s easier to locate a needle in a haystack. Moreover, the tinny recording quality is ugly, constricted, and fatigues the ear within the first 20 seconds. Latimer similarly pounds out Islamey like Rambo gone ballistic, and in this case, accuracy hangs by its sore thumbs.
Incidentally, Latimer includes a wordy apologia, jam-packed with reasons and justifications about why he allows this performance to be issued, citing the marvels contained in equally unspliced, wrong-note-infested examples by Schnabel and Cortot. Funny, I don’t remember Schnabel and Cortot issuing written apologies with their recordings. At any rate, Hamelin’s extraordinary stylish and technical authority in the Alkan remain points of reference, while those who prefer to hear the Concerto handled through more volatile, explosive hands should seek out Jack Gibbons’ recording on ASV. Chalk this release up to a momentary but monumental nosedive from APR’s usual standard of excellence.
