Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)
Piano Sonata No 1 in C, Opus 1
Franz Schubert (1797-1828)
Wanderer Fantasy
Songs (transcribed by Liszt): Der Wanderer, Der Müller unde der Bach, Frühlingsglaube, Die Stadt, Am Meer
Alexandre Kantorow (piano)
rec. Feb & March 2023, Salle de Musique, La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland
BIS2260 Hybrid SACD [73]

When he recorded this in 2023, Alexandre Kantorow was already famous in musical circles as the highly decorated winner of the 2019 Tchaikovsky Competition. In the UK he followed this up with appearances at festivals like the Proms and the Edinburgh International Festival, before being catapulted into superstardom by appearing on a rain-soaked Parisian bridge in the opening ceremony for the 2024 Olympics.

This disc is a reminder of how much he’s the real deal. It’s the third disc in his series of Brahms’ three sonatas (plus more), and he finishes the set with sonata No. 1, surely one of the most confident compositional debuts in musical history. Kantorow has all the muscular technique to make the most of Brahms’ opening C major fanfare, something which also comes in handy for the similar opening of Schuber’s Wanderer Fantasy. However, what quickly strikes you is the sheer variety of what Kantorow can do. That opening bustle quickly settles down into something rippling, tender and lovely, and Kantorow seems equally at home in both extremes of mood. Moreover, he has the poetic directness to find a Fantasie-like quality to the central development section, and he brings similar architectural directness to both the variations of the slow movement and the energetic Scherzo.

In short, not only does he play it brilliantly, but you get the sense that you’re in the presence of someone who has breathed, understood and reimagined Brahms’ music in his own way. That comes through in the rest of the disc, too, which cleverly features both Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy and the song that inspired it. In fact, Kantorow features several of Liszt’s Schubert transcriptions and pays them the great compliment of taking them seriously. There’s no sense of showmanship or charlatanism here, more an appreciate of one great composer responding to the work of another. You get a sense of how much Liszt understood Schubert’s words in the watery pianistic ripplings of Die Stadt and Der Müller und der Bach, and there is unexpected depth to Liszt’s opening out of the vocal line in Der Wanderer and Frühlingsglaube.

That leads into a warm and direct performance of the Wanderer Fantasy which is characterised by the same directness and structural unity that Kantorow brought to the Brahms. There is a strong sense of direction to his playing, musicality that revels in Schubert’s harmonic adventures but ties them together with admirable directness. Yet his playing is never heavy, nor is it particularly rule-bound: instead there is a sense of letting this music live beneath his fingers and creating something organic and exciting.

Pairing these two C major works is a nice piece of programming, and the piano style he brings to it marks this disc as a really special showcase for Kantorow’s talent. The recorded sound is excellent, too, a live concert with some patching, and the Jean-Pascal Vachon’s booklet note is up to BIS’s usual excellent standard.

Simon Thompson

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