CZECH PIANO ANTHOLOGY: Dvorak, Janacek, Smetana, Suk

CZECH PIANO ANTHOLOGY

Piano Works of Dvorak, Janacek, Smetana and Suk

Radoslav Kvapil, piano

For Recording and Tracking data please see the individual releases found on RRC1171, RRC1172, RRC1173, RRC1174.

On Dvorak:Kvapil plays the set with great understanding. He cherishes these curious, reflective tonal sideslips, but also charges vigorously into the more energetic variations. His ability to characterize swiftly and surely is very necessary, as it is in a different manner in the Poetic Tone Pictures...Kvapil is deft and sensitive to the varying textural demands of such varied pieces.

On Janacek: Kvapil responds most vividly to the shorter pieces on this excellent record, the latest volume in the Unicorn-Kanchana's anthology of Czech piano music. He characterizes the changing moods of the Overgrown Path suite with a sure touch, but keeps them in a proper contrsat...he makes them relate to one another within a general mood. That is one, generally of griefs remembered...so Kvapil lends a wistfullness even to the livelier pieces, (They chattered like little swallows), but also makes the anguished No. 8...calm rather than frenzied in its pain. A simular understanding of contrast distinguishes the four beautiful pieces of In the mists, which are marked by a dignified sadness that Kvapil understands well...these are interesting, intelligent and well-executed performances.

On Smetana: Smetana's real originality is better revealed in the shorter pieces, including the polkas...comparisons with Chopin and the mazurkas...same ability to take a national dance and turn it into a vehicle for a wide descriptive range and far-reaching harmonic and rhythmic explorations...popular F sharp minor Polka there is a quick ear for the telling harmonic inflexion, and the exuberance of the A flat Polka...has more than a touch of wistfulness behind the cheerful bounce of the dance. Radoslav Kvapil...able to encompass the tuneful directness...as well as to cope with the "three-handed" effect which Liszt cribbed that Thalberg."

On Suk: Three of these, the Six Pieces (Op. 7), Spring and Summer (Op. 22), antidate the dreadful double blow that befell him in 1904-05, when he lost his much loved father-in-law Dvorak and then his adored wife Otylka; the sequence About Mother belongs to 1907, and is more backward-looking and reflective...excellent anthology of Suk's music...Kvapil has their manner ideally. He can touch a mood of gentleness or wit or, more rarely, something almost wry...most affecting recital.
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