Varduhi Yeritsyan – Scriabin: Piano Sonatas Nos. 1-10 (2015) [FLAC 24bit/96kHz]

Alexander Scriabin – Piano Sonatas Nos. 1-10 – Varduhi Yeritsyan (2015)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 02:08:24 minutes | 1,92 GB | Genre: Classical
Official Digital Download – Source: prestoclassical.co.uk | Digital booklet | © Paraty Productions
Recorded: March 2015 at Théâtre Impérial de Compiègne

A fellow student of Rachmaninov’s at the Moscow Conservatory, where he studied under Arensky and Taneyev, Alexander Scriabin (1872-1915) occupies a unique sphere in Russian music. Rejecting the vocal and folkloristic music that occupied most of his contemporaries, he wrote exclusively for piano and for orchestra. His musical language constantly evolved over the length of his life, passing from the early influence of Chopin and Liszt, through a Wagnerian period, before reaching an atonal style that gazes far into the future of the 20th century’s sound world. Known for her interpretations of Scriabin’s music, which she plays often in recital, Franco-Armenian pianist Varduhi Yeritsyan studied with both Brigitte Engerer and Pierre-Laurent Aimard. She made her UK debut with the BBC Symphony Orchestra in February 2014 at the Barbican where she premiered a new concerto for two pianos, by Bruno Mantovani, written for her and François-Frédéric Guy.

Conventional sets of the ten piano sonatas of Alexander Scriabin typically present them in numerical order, which allows the listener to follow his musical development over the course of 20 years, from his early Chopin-inspired period to the late visionary works. On this 2015 release from Paraty, Varduhi Yeritsyan favors a different arrangement, separating them equally under two headings, “White Mass” and “Black Mass” (taken from the subtitles of the Sonata No. 7 and the Sonata No. 9, respectively), which one might guess separates the lighter and darker works. This is a bit misleading, since Scriabin didn’t conceive his music within that dichotomy, and the highly varied sonatas are not well-served by such a simplistic categorization. Even so, Yeritsyan plays with phenomenal fluency, and whether she is radiating heat and light, as in the Sonata No. 4 and the Sonata No. 10, or brooding in the darkness of the Sonata No. 6, she fully grasps the technical demands of the music, even if its metaphysical import is harder for her to communicate. This may be for the best, because Scriabin’s histrionic mysticism is sometimes a stumbling block, giving pianists permission to be self-indulgent, which the meticulous Yeritsyan never is, and her faithfulness to the printed score is worth more than the atmospheric imprecision some recordings reveal. -AllMusic Review by Blair Sanderson

Tracklist:
Alexander Scriabin (1872-1915)
Piano Sonata No. 10, Op. 70
1 Moderato 12:30
Piano Sonata No. 4 in F Sharp Major, Op. 30
2 I. Andante 2:43
3 II. Prestissimo volando 5:04
Piano Sonata No. 6, Op. 62
4 Modéré 11:53
Piano Sonata No. 3 in F-Sharp Minor, Op. 23
5 I. Dramatico 5:48
6 II. Allegretto 2:28
7 III. Andante 4:08
8 IV. Presto con fuoco 6:14
Piano Sonata No. 7, Op. 64 “White Mass”
9 Allegro 11:42
Piano Sonata No. 8, Op. 66
10 Lento 13:13
Piano Sonata No. 9, Op. 68, “Black Mass”
11 Moderato quasi Andante 8:17
Piano Sonata No. 1 in F Minor, Op. 6
12 I. Allegro con fuoco 7:31
13 II. – 4:50
14 III. Presto 3:41
15 IV. Funèbre 5:28
Piano Sonata No. 2 in G Sharp Minor, Op. 19, “Sonata Fantasy”
16 I. Andante 7:23
17 II. Presto 4:13
Piano Sonata No. 5 in F Sharp Major, Op. 53, “Poem of Ecstacy”
18 Allegro impetuoso con stravaganza 11:18