The solo part of Adolph von Henselt’s once popular and long-out-of-fashion Piano Concerto is more difficult to play than it sounds, with its tricky double notes, relentless roulades, and large stretches that can tax most normal hands. It takes a super pianist to both brave and transcend its challenges. Michael Ponti’s pioneering recording from 1968 blustered through the work like a bull in a china shop, with excitement yet little subtlety and poor orchestra playing. Raymond Lewenthal and Charles Mackerras put things right the following year. Then nothing, until Marc-André Hamelin came along in 1993, and raised the bar for sheer finesse and flexible elegance.
Paul Wee now enters the Henselt sweepstakes. He splits the difference between Lewenthal and Hamelin, mirroring the former’s cutting-edge projection and rhythmic drive, while yielding nothing to Hamelin’s impeccably voiced chord leaps and staggeringly even runs. On occasion Wee seems a bit literal and square when compared alongside the harmonic and melodic pointing resulting from Hamelin’s fluid, instinctive rubato. Yet there’s much to be said for the nervous energy and ferocity Wee brings to the first movement’s development and the near-impossible final pages, and his quasi-operatic declamation of the central Larghetto’s big tunes. Some listeners may also prefer Michael Collins’ leadership of the Swedish Chamber Orchestra here for their leaner orchestral framework and stronger woodwind presence.
Had Liszt and Brahms collaborated on a large-scale work for piano and orchestra, the end product might have sounded something like Hans Bronsart’s 1873 F-sharp minor concerto. Paul Wee and Michael Collins easily surpass their two recorded predecessors (Ponti/Kapp on Vox and Despax/Tzigane on Hyperion). In his first-movement entrance, the pianist launches into his unaccompanied solo with pulverizing sweep and characterful direction, while the Lisztian dotted rhythms in the orchestral tuttis recall the stinging decisiveness of Kirill Kondrashin’s unsurpassed Liszt Concerto accompaniments for Sviatoslav Richter. It’s the exuberant tarantella Finale, however, that seals the deal; compare Despax’s clean efficiency with Wee’s bacchanalian fervor and unfettered joy and hear for yourself. In short, Paul Wee not only has fingers to burn, he’s got cojones to spare. A delectable disc.
