Boieldieu: New recording of Piano Concerto in D & Overtures

[M. Yaskovsky]

A new recording of Boieldieu's Piano Concerto and 6 overtures by Natasa Veljkovic, the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana, conducted by Howard Griffiths https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/cpo/detail/-/art/francois-boieldieu-klavierkonzert-in-f/hnum/8455667

[Alan Howe]

Yes, I wondered about this too. Can anyone shed any light on the concerto (i.e. date, etc.)?

[Gareth Vaughan]

The piano concerto has been recorded before on Vox by Martin Galling and an Innsbruck orchestra iirc. It is an early work and certainly sounds more Classical than Romantic.

[Mark Thomas]

(i.e. date, etc.)?

jpc's blurb says it was premiered in Rouen in 1792. I imagine that most people in the audience had other things on their mind....

[eschiss1]

as in the US in the early 1930s (and not just then), nothing wrong with a bit of escapism. Boieldieu's harp concerto, iirc, has some fairly original features (at least, a concerto in major ending with a movement that begins and ends in minor seems so to this listener)- not sure I know the keyboard concerto.

[Alan Howe]

The piano concerto has been recorded before on Vox by Martin Galling and an Innsbruck orchestra

That piece is in F; the one featured here is apparently in D. Hence my original query. Comparing them, though (now that excerpts are available at jpc), it is evident that it's the same work. So the only issue is what key it's in...

[eschiss1]

I thought it might be, as transcriptions/re-arrangements (rarely exact transcriptions, with at least the solo parts re-written for appropriateness to the instrument, usually) are often in different keys as seem useful to the composer (and so that they don't fall out of tessitura, in some _other_ well-known examples.) With solo-and-keyboard vocal music it's even unusual to specify _a_ key because the several versions are usually coeval transpositions, but in cases like this there probably is one original earliest version (though the earliest known version may give way eventually to "earlier discovered manuscript version" )

[eschiss1]

Checking BNF catalog shows Boieldieu first piano concerto published in 1795 (dedicated to Louis Jadin, published by Ozi, downloadable from Gallica) (and more recently a critical edition of it (or just its first movement, together with the whole harp concerto - not sure) published in 2016). His harp concerto seems not to have been published until 1974 (Ricordi) - not sure. There's also a reduction of the piano concerto published in 1997? I think.

[pianoconcerto]

The cpo CD is of the Boieldieu pc in F; however, there IS a Boieldieu pc in D that pianist Bruno Pietri (1942-2013) reconstructed years ago from manuscript.  I list this in my online discography of music for piano and orchestra <https://www.siue.edu/~aho/discography/Discography.pdf> (always consult the latest version on my university's server and not those on the many mirror sites).  You can hear a live performance of this second Boieldieu piano concerto (which, btw, is not an arrangement of the harp concerto) on Pietri's soundcloud page <https://soundcloud.com/user-176894699/concerto-de-boieldieu-retransmission-radio>.  The performers are not mentioned; however, this appears to be the broadcast by Bruno Pietri, with the Lausanne CO conducted by Armin Jordan.

[Alan Howe]

Wonder why the cpo release describes the PC involved here as 'in D'...

[pianoconcerto]

The "in D" must be a mistake because the soundclips are in F.  Curiously, the soundclip of the second movement begins with the theme in piano alone whereas the Galling recording begins with orchestra alone.  Hopefully the liner notes will explain such differences.  Perhaps there are different editions or someone took liberties with the score.

[semloh]

Like others on UC, I have a sentimental attachment to those old Vox/Turnabout LPs, but it is now over 40 years old so this new CPO release is very welcome. Has anyone seen a review yet?

[kolaboy]

Not a huge fan of the concerto, but I'd buy the disc for the overtures...

[pianoconcerto]

The new cpo recording of the Boieldieu piano concerto in F is worth hearing not only for the better sound and performance, but because it is complete.  Examination of the piano reduction at BnF (https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b9010343c/f1.image) reveals numerous cuts in the old Martin Galling recording on Vox, mainly in solo passages, presumably to streamline the work and reduce "empty virtuosity".  Nataša Veljović's recording on cpo also has some nice ornaments and flourishes not in the BnF score as well as a first movement cadenza that is different from (and more brilliant than) Galling's.  I do not know if these are by the pianist or are included in another edition of the score (no credit is given in the cpo booklet).  Cpo should have promoted this as the first complete recording of the work and have mentioned the Galling's many cuts (timings:  19:42 Galling vs. 26:06 Veljović).  As I mentioned in an earlier post, the second movement's theme is begun by the piano, then joined by the orchestra in the cpo whereas it is given to the orchestra alone in the Vox.  No mention is made of this difference in the cpo booklet (the writer appears unaware of the earlier recording).  Perhaps Vox altered this too.

[eschiss1]

Well, there is iirc a new (A-R) edition of the piano concerto - perhaps comparison with this would help. I'll see if I can find this at a loaning library... (we are talking about the concerto in F related to the harp concerto, not the one in D- right.)