Recording Review #22: Worthy Wang

 

Various Composers and Works. The Vienna Recital. Yuja Wang, pianist. Deutsche Grammophon 486 4567. 

Yuja Wang is a brilliant pianist. But she's a brilliant pianist with a definite range. She tends to be most effective in frenetic or heady stuff that provides an outlet for her limitless exuberance. In too much else she sounds undistinguished at best and mismatched at worst. Happily, this Vienna Recital recording mostly contains music that plays to her strengths. It undeniably shows her to be one of the finest in the business...at what she does best. 

We'll start with the stuff she knocks out of the park. First up are the Kapustin Jazz Preludes (Op. 53, Nos. 10-11) and Ligeti Études (Book 2, Nos. 6 and 13). Frankly, I don't think you're likely to hear better performances of these pieces. In the Kapustin she plays with such disarming verve and technical perfection as to forestall any possible objection. This extremely likable music makes its most powerful impression in the hands of pianists who can convincingly bring off its many technical challenges in a way that makes it all sound snappy and fun. Wang has absolutely no problem here. Likewise, she is every bit equal to the steep demands of the Ligeti études. These are harder on most ears than the Kapustin, but rewarding for those receptive to the timbral effects they explore. It is difficult to think of a more apt advocate than Wang, whose super-charged pianism deftly exploits this music's core qualities. 

I am every bit as impressed with this recital's Albeniz Iberia selections and Scriabin Third Piano Sonata. In the former (Málaga and Lavapiés) Wang plays with breathtaking ebullience and atmosphere, while once more dispatching some fearsome technical difficulties with enviable ease. Again, this is music well suited to her gifts. Wang's Scriabin Third Sonata is tremendous, and here we face another significant feature of her playing: in certain kinds of slow passages, she's just as good as in the quicker stuff. Which kinds? The kinds that radiate a palpable intensity in spite of diminished speed. This describes much of Scriabin's slower music to a T, and explains why the energetic Wang is so good in it. Moreover, she is sensitive to the sonata's many intricate lines and perfume-ish sonorities that make its composer's music so irresistible to fans like me.  

Beyond fine accounts of the Gluck-Sgambati Mellodie dell'Orfeo, and an arrangement the popular Danzón No. 2 by Arturo Márquez, the remaining performances reach lower heights. The obvious place to point here is Wang's interpretation of Beethoven's Op. 31/3 Sonata (No. 18 of 32). She brings plenty of good intention to the task. But despite her suitable cheer and vigor, she has too little temperamental restraint. Op. 31/3 sits at the end of Beethoven's First Creative Period (yes, I capitalized all of that on purpose). It's still a classically-rooted sonata that requires a certain respect for balance and proportion. In the quicker parts especially, Wang just bursts too much at the seams. Her speed and powerful gestures give the impression of a dam barely holding back a flood that threatens to overrun everything. It's not a bad performance, just one that lacks the much better judged wit and sparkle of a Brendel or Kovacevich interpretation (for example). 

The solitary Brahms Intermezzo (Op. 117/3) fares a little bit better than the Beethoven. Here Wang is suitably restrained and even reflective. But I find her tone color to be artificially muted, almost as if she's consciously trying too hard to simmer things down. This miniature should shine with an inner glow that I don't think she's quite mastered yet despite her world-beating technique and élan.

I left the lone Glass étude (No. 6) for last. I absolutely love this piece, along with Glass's other piano études. I also note with pleasure that Wang seems intent on promoting accessible yet highly individual piano music by Glass and Kapustin as the core contemporary literature it deserves to be. This is definitely Yuja Wang using her considerable powers for good! 😀 BUT, I think she plays this particular piece too quickly and forcefully. It has energy, but there are also some little emotions that get lost in the tsunami. I suggest the alternative of Jeroen van Veen (Brilliant Classics 95563). 

All in all, though, this is an impressive album. Fans of the pianist will definitely want to purchase it, and there's also enough interest for nearly everyone else. I've been hard on Yuja Wang in the past. (See my Classical Candor review of her Rachmaninoff concerti here.) But while I still can't give her the highest marks for overall depth and artistic maturity in everything she plays, I'm glad to concede her pre-eminence in other aspects. 

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