BIS’s complete edition of the late Gyorgy Ligeti’s piano music restores both of Fredrik Ullén’s single-disc Ligeti releases, respectively issued in 1996 and 1998. Ullén has supplemented these with the two Etudes Ligeti completed after the original discs came out (À bout de soufflé and Canon), plus two first recordings: L’Arrache-Coeur (a 1994 work originally intended as Etude No. 11) and Four Early Piano Pieces (Basso Ostinato) from 1941. For the two-piano and one-piano-four-hands works, Ullén overdubs himself. As the cliché goes, Ullén may have equals in Ligeti’s innovative Etudes, but few serious rivals.
Granted, some collectors might prefer the warmer, more naturally balanced sonics of Sony’s Ligeti Edition, together with certain Etude performances that tilt the scales (pun intended) in pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard’s favor. For example, Aimard treats Cordes à vide’s polytextural, lyrical lines in a sexier, more pliable fashion than Ullén’s stricter, bleaker reading suggests. And Aimard’s slightly slower tempo for Der Zauberlehrling allows the asymmetrically phrased repeated notes to emerge with greater clarity and dynamic differentiation, whereas they verge on blurring at Ullén’s rapid clip.
On the other hand, Ullén’s incisive traversals of the early Capriccios and Invention surpass Sony’s relatively sober and straight-laced Irina Kataeva. The wonderful three pieces for two pianos rarely have sounded so playful, transparent, and well synchronized. Will Ullén’s multitracking aplomb put conventional piano duettists out of business? On balance, BIS’s completeness factor, the label’s roomy yet detailed engineering, superb notes, reduced price tag, plus Ullén’s effortless, multi-leveled virtuosity deserve nothing less than our highest recommendation. [11/16/2006]
