Reviews | RH-026 | SERGIO FIORENTINO | early live & unissued takes

19 January 2023 | Jonathan Woolf | MusicWeb International | Sergio Fiorentino (piano) - Early Live and Unissued Takes

This single disc covers a period of some 15 years in Fiorentino’s career, delving right back to the Geneva International Music Competition in 1947 when he was still not quite 20. The acetates have been preserved in surprisingly good sound and show him in Bach and Chopin. [...] Rachmaninov’s Fourth Concerto [...] shows that Fiorentino had mastered questions of bravura and balance by this time and was already a leonine and imperturbable soloist. [...] Saga released a number of Fiorentino’s recordings under Pouishnoff’s name and here three are restored and properly attributed. The Mephisto Waltz forms part of Fiorentino’s dazzling Lisztian discography whilst the Polonaise-Fantaisie, and Impromptu No.4 (the Fantaisie-impromptu), reveal a combustible but splendidly proportioned and controlled rhetoric. Pouishnoff could simply not have managed this at his age and in his declining health. [...] Everything is heard in as fine a sound as can be imagined and there are useful biographical notes and photographic reproductions. It’s to Ernest Lumpe that we must turn for thanks for providing the material and to Emilio Pessina for his restorations.

14 January 2023 | Gary Lemco | Audiophile Audition - ☆☆☆☆☆ | Sergio Fiorentino, Piano – Early Live and Unissued Takes, 1947-1962

Producer and editor Emilio Pessina has compiled a series of diverse repertory performed by Italian piano master Sergio Fiorentino (1927-1998), the concerts culled from the collection of Ernst Lumpe. The various performances originate from venues including a live concert in Edinburgh, studio recordings from Hamburg and London, and previously unissued acetate 78s from Geneva’s Victoria Hall. Most happily, the sonic quality from the sources, whether acetates, vinyl, or original master tapes, has been excellently restored, and the electrifying spontaneity of Fiorentino’s playing proves irresistible. [...] A disc well recommended.

3 January 2023 | Jean-Charles Hoffelé | ARTAMAG' - Focus - Le disque du jour | FIORENTINO DE JEUNESSE

Juin 1955, dans le studio de la radio d’Edimbourg, Sergio Fiorentino se mesure au 4e Concerto de Rachmaninov, celui-là même regardé alors comme le plus faible de la série, mais dont il se fera l’avocat obstiné.

La bande originale a été effacée, pratique courante dans les stations régionales de la BBC, mais heureusement une captation de la retransmission a été préservée, la voici. L’enregistrement aurait pu se révéler périlleux, l’orchestre composé par Rachmaninov est délicat à mettre en place, sa fusion avec le pianiste exigeant des réglages fins, hors tout sonne avec un naturel, une évidence, une fluidité jusque dans un Finale d’une électricité folle. Mais écoutez d’abord l’entre chien et loup du Largo, chanté sans un gramme de sentimentalité, ce qui en augmente le caractère élégiaque, et ce trille mordoré à la fin, avec que n’éclate l’orchestre.

C’est le trésor absolu de ce plein disque d’inédits qui brosse un portrait du pianiste en jeune homme, avant l’accident qui le forcera à quelques années de retrait.

L’autorité fabuleuse, le pianisme consommé des deux captations au Concours de Genève, de précieuses acétates, nous offrent une Fantaisie de Chopin d’anthologie, et les prises restées jusque-là inédites des enregistrements londoniens pour Saga révèlent une Méphisto-Valse sous stupéfiants et une Tarentelle de Chopin irrésistible où le clavier chante autant qu’il danse.

In June 1955, in the Edinburgh radio studio, Sergio Fiorentino tackled Rachmaninov's Fourth Piano Concerto, then considered the weakest of the series, but one he would become a staunch advocate of.

The original recording has been erased, a common practice at regional BBC stations, but fortunately, a recording of the broadcast has been preserved, and here it is. The recording could have been perilous; Rachmaninov's orchestral arrangement is delicate to set up, its integration with the pianist requiring fine-tuning. Yet, the result is a sound of naturalness, clarity, and fluidity, right up to a Finale of electrifying energy. But first, listen to the twilight of the Largo, sung without a trace of sentimentality, which enhances its elegiac character, and that golden trill at the end, before the orchestra bursts forth.

This is the absolute treasure of this entire disc of unreleased material, which paints a portrait of the pianist as a young man, before the accident that forced him into several years of seclusion.

The fabulous authority and consummate pianism of the two recordings at the Geneva Competition, precious acetates, offer us an anthology-worthy Chopin Fantasy, and the previously unreleased takes from the London recordings for Saga reveal a Mephisto Waltz under the influence of drugs and an irresistible Chopin Tarantella where the keyboard sings as much as it dances. [JCH]

1 November 2022 | Stephen Greenbank | MusicWeb International | Sergio Fiorentino - early live & unissued takes Pianism of the finest order.

[...] Bach’s Prelude & Fugue No 20 in A minor, BWV 889 (WTC II) is remarkable for its penetrating tone, clarity of articulation and expressive intimacy. Fiorentino intelligently structures the Chopin Fantasie, gradually moving from modest beginnings to high-octane intensity. In the central section he finds poetic serenity. Enthusiastic applause follows each of the items. [...] There’s no doubting that the 4th Concerto (Rachmaninoff) isn’t as memorable as its predecessors. Fiorentino captures the works elusive elements, probing its transient moods and making some success of the concerto as Michelangeli did. His virtuosity is flawless. [...] Liszt’s Mephisto Waltz is a reading of breathtaking brilliance and brimming over with diablerie. Chopin’s Polonaise-fantaisie in A-flat major, Op 61 is rhapsodic and improvisatory in Fiorentino’s hands with an underlying melancholic vein. The central section of the composer’s Fantasy Impromptu is poetically sculpted without resorting to sentimental excess. Chopin’s Tarantella is a dazzling tour-de-force, whilst the pianist’s own arrangement of Rachmaninoff’s Vocalise is soul-searching with a certain elegiac quality. [...] The excellent 24bit 96kHz remasterings by Emilio Pessina do Fiorentino’s memory proud.