Rachmaninov suggestions?

[sacateca]

Karajan only recorded a few works from his catalogue, and yet he's a composer whose works are very close to my heart, so could you good people suggest to me some essential Rachmaninov recordings - symphonies, piano concertos, and piano sonatas in particular? If you care to elaborate why you recommend something in particular, that would be nice, too.

And is that Rachmaninov PC no. 2 Karajan/Weissenberg that's on Youtube available on any DVD? i did a few quick searches for it and came up with nothing.

[sacateca]

That's one attractive DVD! Priced a bit high but certainly worth it. Thanks!

i hope the Karajan - a Portait DVD i just ordered a few days ago doesn't have the same documentary... oh well.

[charlesb]

Rachmaninov symphonies: The best version of all 3 symphonies is probably the one conducted by Ormandy with the Philadelphia Orchestra. If you find amazon.co.uk convenient to use, the price there is £8.99 for the box set. Sony have put it in a different box since I bought it, and maybe remastered the sound, but the version I have has very warm, lush sound.

The only disadvantage is that Ormandy has made cuts in the 2nd symphony. I must confess that I don't notice them when I listen to the symphony, but if you want to hear the complete score, the version by the London Symphony Orchestra and Andre Previn has long been thought of as the ideal version in the UK (also available at Amazon).

If the idea of hearing the symphonies played by the Berlin Philharmonic appeals to you, Maazel's recording of the 3 symphonies is still available. This is an early digital recording, made when Karajan was still alive (the Ormandy and Previn discs were analogue recordings).

The concertosThe Ashkenazy recording of all 4 Piano Concertos is probably best if you want all 4 concertos cheaply (£7.98 at Amazon).

As Waldstein has already said, a Karajan DVD of the 2nd Piano Concerto is available, however he did not mention the EMI CD, which was recorded the year before the video performance. This also includes the performance of Tchaikovsky's 1st Piano Concerto with the Orchestre de Paris, one of the few recordings Karajan made with this orchestra.

The classic account of the 2nd Piano Concerto is the Richter performance on DGG with Wislocki and the Warsaw orchestra. This also includes another Karajan recording of the Tchaikovsky 1st Piano Concerto.

For the 3rd Piano Concerto, many people believe that the Horowitz performances are better than anyone elses. The Naxos transfer of the performance with Reiner is probably the best one to have (if you are happy with a mono recording). Horowitz's DVD with Mehta was also wonderful, but it does not appear to be available at the moment.

Lastly, for the 2nd Piano Sonata I would again recommend Horowitz. His Sony recording is best but that appears to be out of the catalogue at the moment, however his RCA recording is almost as good.

I will leave it to others to give you recommendations for the 1st Piano Sonata and the other solo piano works.

I almost forgot! Ashkenazy's recording of the "Rhapsody on a theme of Paganini" is not included with the Piano Concertos but is available on a CD called "Warsaw Concerto" that also includes Addinsell's famous pastiche of the 2nd Piano Concerto.

Also, avoid Rachmaninov's own recordings of the Piano Concertos. By the time he recorded them, he seems to have become very impatient with the music and the results are disappointing. However, if you can find the recording where he conducts the 3rd Symphony, buy it, it is the best performance of the symphony that I know.

[sacateca]

Thank you, charlesb, for your thoughtful and thorough recommendations. It gives me a good place to start as when looking for what to get from R. i was overwhelmed with different versions, often with names i don't know at all, or only by name.

And those boxsets (i have a liking to the concept of boxsets of complete series of symphonies or concertos from a single performer) are so cheap and attractive that i will get them immediately.

Often though i buy from Amazon.com instead of .co.uk because of postage. In the case of the Ormandy boxset a new one from there seems to cost over 150 dollars, ha-ha. i think the postage from UK will fall short of that.

What it comes to Rachmaninov Plays Rachmaninov, when i heard a sample of that, and perhaps this is just testament to my ignorance, i thought the recording surely must be speeded up! Not only as the speed seems superhuman, but i think also counterproductive (but then, i wouldn't argue that against Rachmaninov) to the compositions. Strange nonetheless. i can't on the whole make any judgment otherwise on the quality of his own performances, though from what i've gathered they should be superior to anything in existence.

The second piano sonata i've heard one version of, Anna Vinnitskaya's, and without having anything to compare it with, i still feel her playing is on the technical and colder side, the piece remains attractive and promising but not compelling - very competently banging out the notes but lacking in interpretation. Which was a bit disappointing as she is Russian and i was under the impression that Russians could not fail to perform Russian compositions in a superior style.