Despite the terminology in common (nobody is really sure what a rhapsody is, anyway), the combination of Rachmaninov's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, Op. 43, and Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue isn't a frequent one, but pianist Martin James Bartlett knits them together nicely. One wouldn't choose his reading of the Rachmaninov Rhapsody on its own; it is very clean but lacks a certain majesty. Stick around, however, for the program is very elegantly done. The career of virtuoso pianist and composer Earl Wild intersected with ...
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Despite the terminology in common (nobody is really sure what a rhapsody is, anyway), the combination of Rachmaninov's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, Op. 43, and Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue isn't a frequent one, but pianist Martin James Bartlett knits them together nicely. One wouldn't choose his reading of the Rachmaninov Rhapsody on its own; it is very clean but lacks a certain majesty. Stick around, however, for the program is very elegantly done. The career of virtuoso pianist and composer Earl Wild intersected with the music of both composers. Wild comes in with arrangements of two Rachmaninov vocal works, and then, after the high-spirited Polka de W.R. (W.R. was the composer's father, Wassily Rachmaninov, although the tune he arranges was actually written by someone else), Wild returns with two of his still-underrated Virtuoso Etudes After Gershwin, framed by two of Gershwin's own treatments of his tunes in the Songbook. Bartlett has the technical wherewithal to handle the demands of the Wild,...
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