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Gershwin Piano and Orchestra works - a super 24/96 download from BIS

Posted by Chris from Lafayette (A) on June 13, 2012 at 00:09:37

So I took the challenge from srl1 (over on Hi-Rez Highway), and downloaded the new BIS recording of Gershwin's works for piano and orchestra (Concerto in F, Rhapsody in Blue, etc.), with pianist Freddy Kempf and the Bergen Philharmonic led by Andrew Litton. So this post is a kind of "shoot from the hip" impression, based on two listenings of the entire album earlier today. My verdict:

Yowzah!



This is quite the recording! In conductor Walter Damrosch's words, Gershwin “made a lady out of jazz”. I wonder if Damrosch would have said that if he had heard these performances, probably the most suggestive I've ever encountered - I've never heard as much bending and sliding of tones as we hear from the Bergen players - it's positively lurid! Add to this a kind of heroic aggression adopted by both soloist and orchestra in the faster parts, and you have some very individual performances of these well known works. My wife and I were very taken with every one of them. About the only thing I would criticize is that at about 9:15 in the first movement of the Concerto in F, Kempf is going so fast that he can't articulate the dotted rhythms and has to even out the note values in order to maintain his tempo. But this is the kind of "mistake" I can forgive, because it's obvious that the pianist is taking a risk, and his level of risk-taking is simply beyond the capabilities of less technically gifted pianists. One further point: I haven't checked the booklet yet, so I don't quite know what's going on, but some of the orchestraion sounds different from what I'm used to on other recordings (e.g., extra percussion in places where I never heard it before).

As for the engineering, the 24/96 two-channel recording I downloaded from eClassical is exceptional, with a perfect combination of clarity and blend - very "up close and personal" with spectacular definition on the many percussion instruments. And the bass goes down low but stays focused. In fact, the focus of the whole acoustic environment is one of the most impressive things about this recording. Honestly, I can't for life of me understand the criticisms of BIS engineering I've read both here on Hi-Rez Highway and on SA-CD.net. What are these folks listening through? And it looks good too - a spectrograph of the third movement of the Concerto in F is shown beow:



(Notice - no DSD high frequency noise dusting!)

I have other hi-rez recordings of the Rhapsody and the Concerto, and none of the others is as high octane as this new BIS recording! I was just a bit disappointed by the Naxos Blu-ray audio with Orion Weiss and Joanne Falletta: these performances are so laid back that they lose excitement and even sound a bit careful at times. Also, although the bass goes low on the Naxos recording, it spreads and lacks the focus of the BIS recording. Interpretively midway between this new Kempf recording and the Weiss recording is the SACD on Harmonia Mundi by Jon Nakamatsu and the Rochester Phil conducted by Jeff Tyzik. I think this Nakamatsu/Tyzik recording is a valid alternative to the Kempf/Litton. The Harmonia Mundi engineering captures a "bigger" space with more blend and less clarity than the BIS recording - percussion on the Nakamatsu recording seems way further back. (I'm trying to be objective here, since, as I've mentioned before, I rehearsed both the Rhapsody and the Concerto in F with Jon before his first performances of these works.) Finally, there's the old reliable standard: the BMG SACD reissue of the Earl Wild / Arthur Fiedler / Boston performances. And this early 60's recording really does hold up very well - Wild is excellent throughout, although Fiedler allows some moments of imprecision sometimes in the orchestral parts. The sound still strikes me as excellent - it captures the reverberation of the hall very well and exhibits the typical sonic integration of minimally microphoned recordings from that "golden age of stereo", even though it's not quite as clear in texture as the modern recordings. In sum, I think all of these hi-rez recordings are worthy, with the Weiss/Falletta recording at a bit less distinguished level. But if I want maximum thrills and characterization, I think that in the future I'm going to reach for this new BIS recording with Kempf and Litton, with their Norwegian cohorts.

This post is made possible by the generous support of people like you and our sponsors:

Kimber Kable

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