Fanfare Magazine, Issue 34:5 (May/June 2011)
on Florian Uhlig's recording of Schumann's Works for Piano and Orchestra (Hänssler Classic CD 93.264)
Uhlig really sweeps the cobwebs from the Piano Concerto, in a galvanizing traversal without a hint of routine. The first movement is fresh, ardent, urgent, and phenomenally articulate—at 13:13, the fastest version I know (Argerich/Rabinovitch, from Lugano on EMI, come close at 13:37, but she is nowhere near her best form here, and her overwrought exaggerations are no match for the dashing élan of the newcomer). The Intermezzo is flowing and delicately pointed, with beautifully sensitive orchestral work. The finale goes with a wonderful snap and crackle, accents gleefully punched home, but always in the service of the larger shape of the phrase. The two concert pieces are equally successful: The better-known op. 92 in G has the requisite surging, seething quality, the demanding passagework always molded with sinuous, flexible expression as well as chiseled clarity. In the late D-Minor work, with its very different style of piano writing—now of a Brahmsian weight and fullness—Uhlig throws himself into a performance of total commitment (hear his memorable response to the development section’s injunction to play “mit Kraft”). Conducting and orchestral work are alert, idiomatic, and technically expert throughout. The main competition in the three major works comes from Perahia/Abbado/Berlin Philharmonic (Sony), and I’d certainly be sorry to lose them, for their patrician elegance and burnished glow. But I’d now be even sorrier to part with Uhlig/Poppen, for their technical aplomb, delicate poetic feeling, and volatile excitement in sharp primary colors. And that’s not even considering the new disc’s ostensible raison d’être, in the reconstructed pieces. This disc is a winner, and deserves to sell like the proverbial hotcakes.
Boyd Pomeroy