Rachmaninoff: original 4th concerto available

(September 2001)

Fresh insights into Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No.4 are being provided by the reappearance of his original 1926 version, now newly available on hire from Boosey & Hawkes. The first performance since the 1920s took place in Helsinki earlier this year linked with sessions for the recently released Ondine recording (ODE 977), where it is coupled with the composer’s first version of his Piano Concerto No.1. Performers on the disc are Vladimir Ashkenazy as conductor and Alexander Ghindin as soloist.

Rachmaninoff worked on his Piano Concerto No.4 on and off for 12 years, interrupted by his military service in the First World War, his flight from Russia before the Revolution and his battles to support his family financially in the USA as a concert pianist. The concerto was finally completed in 1926 but immediately after its 1927 premiere with the Philadelphia Orchestra under Stokowski the composer had doubts about the practicality of the work’s expansive duration, and made amendments and cuts before its publication in 1928. Even so, audiences and critics did not react favourably, and he dropped the concerto from his repertoire. It was not until 1941 that he returned to the score, making further cuts and changes to produce the 1944 published version that is generally performed today.

Ashkenazy describes the differences between the two versions in a Gramophone interview (October 2001 issue): “The most radical change between the manuscript and the revision comes in the last movement – there’s a huge section that disappeared and the final build up to the coda is completely different... Rachmaninoff was always insecure about his compositions. He was always willing to cut pieces if people suggested it.” A return to the composer’s first thoughts therefore offers an intriguing alternative view of the work, if its evolution had not been necessitated by historical and personal circumstances. As the Gramophone review pointed out, the 1926 version does “in many ways feel like the more authentic embodiment of Rachmaninoff’s creative struggles.”

> Further information on Work: Piano Concerto No.4

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Sergei Rachmaninoff

Major works by this popular Russian composer include Piano Concerto No.2, Symphonic Dances and Paganini Rhapsody.