Contes & Poemes

"In… 'The faded flower' and 'Did we not dance', Yana Ivanilova's singular interpretative skills underline the unpredictability of Medtner's setting, and she is moving as 'Sleeplessness' drifts into vocalise. …Berezovsky makes the fiendish 'Mach of the Paladin' and 'Campanella' sounds technically easy but emotionally elusive, and his programme elicits several fascinating parallels between songs and skazki." BBC Music Magazine, February 2009 ****

"Among the vocal selection here there are some little gems… sung with expressive intensity by the warmly lyrical Yana Ivanilova and the magnificent Vassily Savenko. Boris Berezovsky, the creative force behind this programme, has cherry-picked eight of the more than 30 Skazki that most closely reflect the songs. He plays these wonderfully well. If you haven't yet got into Medtner, this new disc is a compelling introduction to his world." Gramophone Magazine, March 2009

As gifted a pianist as Prokofiev, and a composer whom Rachmaninov rated more highly than himself, Nicolaï Medtner (1880-1951) has long been neglected, a victim both of circumstances (the Russian revolution, emigration, war) and of his difficulty in adapting to 1920s Berlin and 1930s Paris, two hotbeds of a modernity that was fundamentally alien to him. This CD gives us a chance to discover the last of the great Romantics, a worthy heir to Chopin and Brahms who celebrated the great poets, both Russian and German, faithful to the double culture of his origins. 17 of Medtner's finest songs are accompanied here by 8 Skazki, literally 'tales' for piano, or 'poems without words'. Boris Berezovsky is in his element in this repertoire.