|
Back
03/26/2026
Robert Schumann: Fantasie in C major, opus 17 – Carnival Scenes from Vienna, opus 26 – Humoreske in B-Flat major, opus 20
Nikolai Lugansky (piano)
Recording: Gustav-Mahler-Hall, Euregio, Kulturzentrum, Dobbiaco, Italy (May 26-28, 2025) – 84’ 16
harmonia mundi HMM902753 (Distributed by [Integral]) – Booklet in French, English and German
Can we put aside world politics for a moment? I’d like to say some positive words about the Russian pianist, Nikolai Lugansky, specifically about his new album of Schumann works for solo piano. Lugansky may be Russian in a war-torn planet, but his art is timeless and universal. Now in his early 50s, Lugansky has emerged as one of the most gifted pianists of his generation. This album in particular is a kind of litmus test for verifying his validity. It offers Lugansky the chance to soar beyond the limits of mere virtuosity, into a strange but welcoming world of shifting shadows and tonal colors as unexpected as a rainbow at daybreak.
This album features three works from throughout the career of Robert Schumann, who was a bridge between the early romanticism of Schubert and the Golden Age of the romantic piano associated with Chopin and Liszt. These works are: the Fantasie in C major, Carnival Scenes from Vienna (not to be confused with Schumann’s earlier and more familiar Carnaval, opus 9), and Humoreske in B-Flat major.
Today, the listener can choose to enjoy the selections on this album as three distinct works or as individual movements: each of the 16 tracks a bright gem radiant with its own merits. But more than Schumann’s inspired composition, it was Lugansky’s musical choices that I found riveting and rich with meaning. We hear so much from young artists raised in an atmosphere of über-competitiveness. Here is a pianist at the peak of his powers who listens both to the specifications of the composer and to the dictates of his heart.
What I especially liked about this album was the range of colors he discovers as he expresses the great romantic’s enveloping vision. These are not selections an occasional classical listener may know, but they are immediately accessible under Lugansky’s revealing touch. There are moments one can almost hear Beethoven’s ghost (as I did in Track 3), echoing the mysterious final sonatas.
From the impassioned opening of the Fantasie to the last meandering whisper of the Humoreske, this is an album for connoisseurs and dreamers. Lugansky has the gift of making Schumann’s expansively romantic spirit palpable and true for our time and for the ages.
Linda Holt
|
