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Originally Posted by calaf
I think Pollini sounds (rightly) bored in the first two concertos. But from No 3 onwards he puts on the backburners and leaves Fleisher behind in dynamics and insight: Fleisher plays Beethoven like a classic, Pollini like a modern. As Bunny points out, this is exactly what Pollini does in the late sonatas (listen for example to his jazzy Op 111 recording). In the end it is (surprise, surprise) a matter of taste: I am enthralled by what Pollini finds in Beethoven, but I understand that if you are more interested in the romantic side of his music, Pollini is not for you. Ironically, I think that, with their infinite precision and transparency, Szell/Cleveland would have been the ideal band for Pollini.
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I don't know what type stove you have been using, but the back burners are traditionally the weaker ones, so if he puts on the back burners, that's going to be a simmer rather than a sear.
Or maybe you were referring to those afterburners that jet engines use?
If you like Pollini's Beethoven, then the earlier set with Karl Böhm beats Abbado's to flinders. Abbado's Beethoven is, as is his Mahler, less magisterial and more introspective and Pollini's solo turns just don't mesh as well with Abbado as with Böhm. Unfortunately, the sound quality on the earlier cycle (which is actually a compilation, Jochum conducts the first two concertos) is a bit problematic -- it sounds almost as if the piano was in another room from the orchestra in some passages and it was back in the days when DG liked to supersize that instrument with overly close miking. Also, be warned, Böhm's first chord in the Emperor comes out like a crack of thunder and can easily blow a speaker if the volume isn't regulated carefully.
As for the 4th, give me Moravec any day of the week over Pollini.
