Peter Serkin

Peter Serkin, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa – Schoenberg: Piano Concerto, Op. 42; 5 Piano Pieces, Op. 23 & Phantasy, Op. 47 (1968/2017)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 48:11 minutes | 1,73 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Sony Classical

He is “one of those rarities, a natural conductor”, exclaimed one reviewer after Seiji Ozawa’s Chicago Symphony debut on July 16, 1963 at the orchestra’s Ravinia Festival. “His technical facility is phenomenal, his sense of rhythm both solid and subtle, and his knowledge of scores… detailed and intimate.” Another Chicago critic concurred: “His conducting technique reminds you of his teacher, Herbert von Karajan, in that it lays the score in the lap of the orchestra with transparency of gesture and human communication, then commands acceptance.” At the end of the season, the 27-year-old podium sensation was appointed the festival’s first-ever music director, and in the years that followed Ozawa also became a regular CSO guest at Orchestra Hall, its downtown home.

Between 1965 and 1968, he and the orchestra made a series of remarkable albums for RCA. Selected releases are now remastered form the original master tapes and releases for the first time on HighResAudio. They represent an early high-point — perhaps unsurpassed — in the Japanese maestro’s long and distinguished recording career. Featured among these dynamic Ozawa/Chicago performances are three cornerstones of the symphonic repertoire: the Beethoven and Tchaikovsky Fifth Symphonies and the Schubert “Unfinished”, all remastered from the original analogue tapes for this edition.

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Peter Serkin, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa – Bartók: Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 3 (1966/2017)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 52:17 minutes | 2,14 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Sony Classical

What fun this album is! True, today you can get all three Bartk piano concertos on a single disc, but these two performances from the mid-1960s, featuring the hot young talent of Peter Serkin and Seiji Ozawa, really deserve a home in the collection of anyone who cares about this music. With the Chicago Symphony in top form, the team blazes through the percussive First Concerto with take-no-prisoners gusto, especially in the finale. The Third Concerto, a more lyrical work to begin with, still sustains a remarkable degree of tension, and sounds as fresh as the day it was written. The central Andante religioso is completely captivating, the tempo perfectly chosen and Serkin finding poetry in just about every bar. The sonics are very clear, but also somewhat two-dimensional. Bartk’s interesting writing for low winds and percussion in the First Concerto is very well caught, but given the spotlight on the piano you’ll need to fiddle with the volume to find a comfortable listening level.” (David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday). Still, these are undoubtedly great performances, and it’s delightful to see them reissued on HighResAudio.”
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