If I Could Choose Only One Recording By...CLAUDIO ARRAU

[@melissaking6019]

Arrau's Liszt Sonata del Petrarca 123 is exquisite. Arrau had the unique ability to make his music sound profound.

[@lalahohoable]

I totally agree, this recording is much more than a show, but music of extreme virtuosity performed with excellent taste and emotional and musical control

[@tarakb7606]

I couldn't agree more. Arrau treats the pieces with the respect they deserve and thus makes you realise what masterpieces they are. I have never tired of this recording even though I bought my first copy forty five years ago.

[@179cpv]

My favorite Arrau recording is the one he did in the 1960s of Beethoven’s 4th Piano Concerto with Haitink and the Concertgebouw Orchestra. Always preferred the 4th over the better known Emperor Concerto and nobody brought it to life like Arrau. His Liszt recordings are undeniably outstanding, but my favorite Liszt interpreter is Kentner.

[@RaineriHakkarainen]

Wilhelm Kempff Emil Gilels more colorful beautiful piano for Beethoven concertos no 4 and no 5! Dimitri Bashkirov her teacher Anastasia Virsaladze teach saying to Bashkirov the most important lesson is the love of beautiful colorful piano sound!

[@RaineriHakkarainen]

Vladimir Ashkenazy had More colorful volcano beautiful piano sound for Beethoven concerto no 5 than Arrau!

[@KBMars]

Wonderful, thank you for featuring Claudio Arrau. Noble is the perfect word for him. I would pick his Brahms first piano concerto with Haitink on Philips. To me the greatest recording of the most thrilling classical music piece. Nothing comes close for me.

[@marcosviniciosribeirocompo1137]

I agree !!

[@michelangelomulieri5134]

Agree about the choice of Liszt as the composer with whom Arrau had a close connection (he studied with Martin Krause, one of Liszt’s pupils). But I’d have picked up the B minor sonata: undert his fingers the sonata is weightier and more profound than all rivals, and you listen to him playing it and think not what a great performance but what an incredible composition!

[@jagareco]

i cannot agree more with you on this comments. that Arrau's recording is more than exceptional, it has all the elements of music, from tenderness to fury, with so many moments in which the "atmosphere" of the performance and the recording makes magic

[@harrycornelius373]

Tough choice for Arrau. On the Liszt side, the Sonata is also a contender. While the sonata is one of the monuments of piano literature , and while it is the highest expression of his compositional architecture and narrative genius it is a summation of the classical sonata. So it is backwards looking whereas the etudes are a bold statement of romanticism Arrau’s late Beethoven sonatas are also contenders. But I agree with this choice because of the range of works in the etudes and because so many people don’t get Liszt

[@Gregory47342]

My all time Arrau piece has to be Beethoven Moonlight sonata 1st movement. I like the way he shows such incredible control on his volume especially the soft notes.

[@FerdinandGommers]

Chopin nocturne 62 02 is my favorite with the Schumman Chopin/Chiarina Carnaval. These are very different and special to me.

[@i.m.takkinen]

For Walter Gieseking I guess his recordings of Debussy's works for piano and if we are narrowing it down for Kankrasanz the Suite Bergamasque should keep him at bay.

[@kathleenbrady9916]

You're really helping my musical education, I can't find some of the recordings you recommend but can listen to others....I love the details of the composers' lives too ....

[@michaelk6057]

Funny, when I saw the topic I immediately thought of the Liszt Sonata which is my touchstone for that work and a piece I would place above the Transcendental Etudes, as much as I enjoy them. I remember the Arrau performance of the Sonata was your top pick so we're probably not far off.

[@DavesClassicalGuide]

No, it was a hard decision, but I went with the Etudes because, as I mentioned, they are usually viewed as "trashier" and so benefited more from Arrau's approach, whereas the Sonata has usually gotten a lot of respect (and has a lot more fine recordings).

[@nelsoncamargo5120]

I would choose Beethoven last piano sonatas. No one played them like Arrau.

[@robertdandre94101]

claudio arrau....for me my best recording of his remains the 24 preludes of chopin on phillips...lively, made with a lot of character for each piece, made without glamour, a recording that I would take to a desert island. ....and by the way, anecdote reported by the critic Claude Gingras who interviewed Claudio Arrau passing through Montreal...._mr Arrau the rachmaninoff repertoire is absent as far as you are concerned.....? ....:-rachmaninoff...????? he only wrote music for piano bar...._ but mr arrau did you know that he had composed symphonies....?...._ symphonies....????? ?

[@John.B.Ellis27]

Barring a couple of private recordings, I'm an Arrau completionist as far as music collections go ... Arrau's recording of Liszt's "Bénédiction de Dieu dans la solitude" is one of the very few performances that I could hear for eternity and--a thousand years later, and later still--feel like it was Heaven rather than Hell. That is THE ONE from Arrau in my book.

[@jagareco]

i has been collecting Arrau recordings last three decades. Benediction has an Amsterdam live performance which is far better than studio (same thing with the ballade, almost always better live than studio). if you wnat you can write me back, i´m collaborator on Arrauhouse. regards

[@John.B.Ellis27]

@@jagareco How may I contact you? Arrau House is one of the greatest online testaments to an artist.

[@OuterGalaxyLounge]

I like that Dave is our mortal Earthly representative in the Court of Cancrizans. Our guy knows how to play the long con and wear down that capricious Being.

[@DavesClassicalGuide]

I am trying...

[@andy_pandy88]

Hi Dave, thanks for this great new series! As you continue could you put a list of the recordings you’ve mentioned so far in the description? I’m going to make an Apple Music playlist of these recordings 😊

[@DavesClassicalGuide]

Not for this series--they will be in a dedicated playlist, though. The problem is that the list will grow too long, too quickly.

[@andy_pandy88]

@@DavesClassicalGuide fair enough, I’ll just check the playlist then. Thanks!

[@geertdecoster5301]

Can't wait for the next one 🤓

[@matthiasriewald7168]

Yes, this recording is one of the absolute highlights in the Stereo Years 50-disc Philips cube. I still hope that you will review these box sets some day! - Or here is a disturbing thought: Could it be that you actually don´t have these boxes because you are too serious a collector to bother with such more or less random stuff?

[@DavesClassicalGuide]

No, I have them, and never look at them because, well, you know...

[@classicallpvault]

Arrau's Liszt Etudes are second to none. He is one of the few pianists who gets 'Feux Follets' right - a depiction of the 'Irrlicht', the will of the whisp as depicted in Central European mythology, where they are regarded as the lost souls of children who died before baptism. Almost every other pianist whose recordings I have heard treats it like it's some Satan-inspired Paganini-esque showpiece, which means that it loses any connection to its programmatic content.

[@paulbrower]

Oh, that would be difficult. He recorded extensively and I could listen to ANYTHING that he performed with cofidence. Someone might do something better in the repertory, but nobody does everything as well. (Rubinstein, Kempff, Serkin, Gilels, Lupu, Ashkenazy, Gieseking, Pollini, Brendel). Did these do Liszt's magnificent Transcendental Etudes? This is the definitive recording of this work. About everything that he performed has some competent competition. This is a great collection of works, one that I respect (much that Liszt wrote was Kitsch. This isn't).

[@RaineriHakkarainen]

Come on! Arrau never was the greatest! Dimitri Bashkirov her teacher Anastasia Virsaladze teach saying to Bashkirov the most important lesson is the love of beautiful colorful piano sound! More colorful beautiful piano sound than Arrau=Wilhelm Kempff Emil Gilels Radu Lupu Artur Rubinstein Vladimir Ashkenazy Grigory Sokolov! More genius than Arrau=Sviatoslav Richter Solomon Cutner Grigory Sokolov Maurizio Pollini Stanislav Bunin Maria Grinberg Murray Perahia Alexei Lubimov Dinu Lipatti Stanislav Igolinsky! More powerful louder than Arrau=Mikhail Pletnev! The Second Loudest ever was Lazar Berman! The 3rd Loudest was Erwin Nyiregyhazi! Beethoven wanted louder instruments piano fortes! Horowitz his technique attack better than Arrau's technique!! Arrau had not the best piano sound! Arrau not the best genius! Arrau not the most powerful! Arrau had not the best technique!!

[@Warp75]

I waiting for your Simon Rattle….I’m assuming it will be a Szymanowski recording

[@DavesClassicalGuide]

I'll get to him in 75 years or so. Perhaps he will do something else good in that time.

[@davidaiken1061]

Many thanks, Dave, for another fun series. Just catching up with it today. Arrau ennobled everything he touched, not least Liszt. Cancrizans wil be happy with your choice. Ditto Munch's "Fantastique." Two suggestions for an offering to the dark god: Sir Adrian Boult's recording of Vaughan Williams's "Job," and Martha Argerich's recording of Rach 3 with Chailly and the RCO. As for Boult, I dislike the fact that he is often typecast as a British "specialist." His sympathies went far further. However, he is rightly remembered for his Elgar and Vaughan Williams. He knew both composers and his recordings of both have a special authority. His RVW "Job" is still the reference recording. As for Argerich, who has given us such a thrilling (live!) account of Rach 3? Juja Wang's recent live outing with Dudamel pales by comparison.