Khachaturian "Piano Concerto" Alicia de Larrocha

[@Hervinbalfour]

Yes! The FLEXATONE IN MOVEMENT II!!!

[@PAULanthonyROMERO]

so other-wordly

[@Michael-Oh]

Came for the flexitone and was not disappointed!

[@ljiljanastanic9076]

Splendour,enchanting beauty🎀♥️♥️♥️

[@elizabethhewitt6182]

I love to hear the flexatone

[@hasmikaghuzumtsyan6195]

i'm so proud the great genius Aram Khachaturian is Armenian! His "Piano Concerto" is a very emotional and strong piece of world music. Thank you maestro and Alicia de Larrocha!

[@robertwebster]

Hear the producers clumsy edit just before the flexitone at 18.23. Maybe they were less fussy 40 years ago. Still this is one of the best interpretations of this strange piece I think. As a 15 year old (40 years ago) the piano cascading down in chord clusters at 22.36, gave me goose bumps. It's still thrilling.

[@ronaldbwoodall2628]

No, I can't in fact hear an edit at all at the place you point out; I hear nothing amiss or questionable; it sounds to me only like the normal sound of the action of a piano. Maybe it's due to my using ear-buds at the library for listening purposes, or maybe it's because you are more fussy today - after all, this was (is) a commercially released LP by London/Decca. (However, if you can find the Pennario/Slatkin Capitol LP, it should make you deem this one superfluous, whatever merit it rightly has.)

[@MrJbee1982]

Too much liberty taken. Needs more drive, a little less emotion.

[@schpongleded]

I listened to the cleaner versions, and I must say I like this interpretation best of the all.

[@davesmith6815]

+Jeremy Murray What are you saying in pure musical terms? Do you have a problem with the tempi, the dynamics? In all my lifetime of study of piano and violin, no one I studied with, or played with would use those terms to explain or teach, at least not standing alone. "Too much liberty?" What, you think there is too much rubato? How exactly are you identifying the excess of emotion in her playing? Really, I'd like you to try and explain, because, honestly, it's a tremendous performance, true to the score and Khachaturian's concept of the piece from every single piece of evidence I know of and careful listening. Just wondering what you think you know about it?

[@MrJbee1982]

It needs to be crisper, cleaner and faster in the fast sections. Yes, the musician must take liberties in the more melodic and improv-like sections, but not too much or it ends up sounding "goopy, gloppy, and laborious". Basically, she isn't playing the piece with enough drive/forward motion.... its boring in my opinion.

[@thevector384]

Whose version do you recommend?!

[@kirsteni.russell5903]

Alicia de Larrocha has the right touch for this piano concerto. I first heard it performed by William Kapell, a pianist of an earlier time, on a set of 78 r.p.m. records. My older sister and I used to sit in front of the record player, open-mouthed at Kapell's playing. I now have Kapell's version on CD--he was famous for playing this concerto. But I must say that Alicia de Larrocha performs this concerto with the clarity and passion it demands!

[@victormanuelpadilla1845]

Excelente!! Bravo! La gran pianista española Alicia De Larrocha (RIP) ejecutó magistralmente esta magnífica y compleja obra del ilustre compositor armenio Aram Khachaturian. Obra musical fantástica con tintes orientales. GRACIAS! Bendiciones! desde MÉXICO.

[@rbooy3]

Great little (paradox) Spanish lady with immense power and genius.

[@andresrozsa637]

Technically perfect, but I've heard live performances and other recordings of this that were far more exciting. She was a genius though - nobody played Albeniz and Granados like she did.

[@michaelreid6937]

As a longtime de Larroccha fan, her work w/ Khachaturian is like opening a glorious time capsule ☺. And, the flexatones 👏👏👏

[@sergixtepec1]

Una de las versiones más bellas que he escuchado de este precioso concierto.. Me fascina el aire del Andante con ánima. Bello. felicitaciones

[@ondinehd6889]

Great performance of this great concerto!

[@veronicagombach1067]

Flexatone à 18:25 !!! Super !!!

[@ThePianoFortePlayer]

mov 1 mov 2 15:40 mov 3 26:27

[@Drakonurion]

Khachaturian & de Larrocha - what a great combination :-D

[@cidarta_souza]

Execução brilhante 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

[@ronaldbwoodall2628]

Not only is this Khatchaturian's finest concerto, I think it is one of the greatest piano concerti ever written. It is all pure inspiration and genius, and has none of the bombast or pretentiousness that could be leveled against some of this composer's works. As such, its qualities are only enhanced by differences in interpretations. I was introduced to it many years ago with the Capitol LP with Leonard Pennario and Felix Slatkin (Leonard's father) conducting, which remains my favorite one, but de Larrocha's is great also. The concerto will never get old for me; I just wonder why it isn't performed at concerts more often!

[@kirsteni.russell5903]

I wonder if all pianists can play this as well as those few who do. I first heard it in a recording of William Kapell, a pianist of another age, playing, and it just didn't sound like any other Russian piano concerto. Not Tchaikovsky, not Rachmaninoff--of course, pianists need great skill and feeling to play those Russian masters' piano concertos, but Khachaturian doesn't sound like them. His piano concerto is darker, but exciting, and Alicia de Larrocha is a pianist who can convey the passion and clarity of the concerto. Bravo!

[@zarapapazyan4580]

@@kirsteni.russell5903 why should it sound like any other Russian concerto, Khachaturian is Not Russian composer he is Armenian

[@sarahhearn-vonfoerster7401]

I've always loved playing this unique concerto , also inspired by Leonard Pennario recording given to me by my piano Professor my Sophomore year (1970s). It so reflected world events at that time....and was as much a psychological escape mechanism for me as am emotional one! Remains true today!!

[@sarahhearn-vonfoerster7401]

@@kirsteni.russell5903 I miss Bill Kapell so much...such a tragic loss. He, Pennario, and de la Roche truly are icons for this particular explosion of sound!

[@sarahhearn-vonfoerster7401]

@@zarapapazyan4580 No, he was born in Georgia, Russia and was Russia's foremost composer/conductor until he immigrated to America!

[@davesmith6815]

So. Some of you had always listened to another performance of this and you're unhappy with how this is different. Is that it? Really?? Sad. Get a clue. Learn to appreciate many excellent performers. There's little excuse for that kind of narrow-mindedness. If you can't bear it, just don't listen, go away and listen to your favorite version, and stop trolling.

[@ronaldbwoodall2628]

I see you ate some sour grapes that day, Dave. Don't you really have a favorite performer among those many excellent performers you appreciate? If you, or anyone else, does, do you really consider that narrowmindedness? Isn't it rather, just a subjective preference due to many factors? I certainly think so. And no one is saying that you shouldn't listen to different versions, or that they can't "bear" this one; that inference is nowhere evident.

[@tonistrubell5754]

Magnífica interpretació de la nostra Alícia de Larocha. I fa molts d'anys.

[@red-mundo7173]

Bellísima pieza. La hube escuchado por primera vez cuando tenía como 13 años.

[@ewaldsteyn469]

Too slow. For two much greater recordings in fine sound quality listen to the recordings of Antonín Jemelík with Alois Klíma and the Czech Philharmonic (a brilliant, fast and exciting performance) and Yakov Flier with Kiril Kondrashin and the Moscow Philharmonic (slower but more powerful than Jemelik, but still not lacking un the necessary drive). Two magnificent performances to rank alongside the old classic by William Kapel.

[@jchenergy]

The musical saw as I heard it for the first time some 38 years ago! Gigantic performance by the great spanish couple .

[@kevincushman9872]

Check out William Kapell's version with The Boston Symphony Orchestra, Serge Koussevitzky conducting.

[@th-wp7zc]

this is better.

[@kirsteni.russell5903]

I have William Kapell's version--the first version I ever heard, way back in my childhood. My mother had a recording she used to play. So that's the version I know in my bones. This version is excellent, though.

[@christopherwilliams6896]

@@kirsteni.russell5903 I had an old LP of this 50 years ago with Aram K himself conducting---it was mind-boggling. I have been looking for that version again ever since. This is very nice, though...

[@xxxyyy9544]

I think this and the Mindru Katz versions are among the best

[@gabrieru1983]

Lovely performance....but it should have been a "Musical Saw" instead of a "Flexatone".

[@enriquesanchez2001]

UTTERLY magnificent!!!!!!!!!!

[@samddee454]

Grand and eloquent piece of music, but what is that strange-sounding instrument around the 18:00 mark? Sounds like a musical saw.

[@lucasgust7720]

Every performance of Alicia is something special.

[@川口健太郎-m5e]

My favorite piano concerto ethnic classic music

[@himitsunosallychan]

フレクサトーンが嬉しい :)

[@monelleny]

For the ultimate interpretation, listen to William Kapell.

[@MrKevinandChris]

Absolutely. There's Kapell and Koussevitzky; then there's everyone else.

[@sarahhearn-vonfoerster7401]

+Kevin Cushman AND Pennario

[@sarahhearn-vonfoerster7401]

+monelle Also, the great Leonard Pennario on the magnificent Baldwin.He was the first to really showcase this concerto.

[@monelleny]

+Sarah Hearn-vonFoerster - Thank you, I will look for it!

[@sarahhearn-vonfoerster7401]

monelle De Larocha's " Nights in the Gardens of Spain" can not be surpassed .She is a magnificent pianist.

[@bckm54]

in the second mvt., after the flexatone finishes playing, there's a "letdown" when it reverts to a "normal" orchestra. ;)

[@nedhopkins897]

I'd like to learn that Khachaturian did not write the flexitone part, that it was added to the score by, perhaps, Lavrentiy Beria.

[@danielgonzalezjr8350]

Ned Hopkins He wrote to flexatone part.

[@BrucknerMotet]

What, no love for Yuri Andropov?

[@osamamalluhi8922]

A very interesting piano concerto specialy the second movement

[@nielswalen]

I hear the flexatone here for the first time. Interesting...... BUT THE FIRST PART OF THE SECOND MOVEMENT DROWNS IN SENTIMENTILITY, destroys my mood. At the end the soloist takes revanche and lets the music express itself, Great!!

[@polenc7167]

In this, the age of science and technology, the artist must strive to eliminate emotion and be unbiased at all times. Speak in a Monotone and be perfectly boring. Also, if you are a true modern artist you will never do anything fun or interesting. Bravo, Khachaturian!

[@sarahhearn-vonfoerster7401]

@@polenc7167 The second movement is the soul of Armenia in Kachaturian...I am sure that he was reared on the tragic destruction of the Armenian homeland.... at one time, it was an independent country, I believe.