Jorge Bolet & Franz Schubert
- Blue Pumpkin
- Mar 3
- 2 min read
Jorge Bolet & Franz Schubert.
On 30 January - 2 February 1989, Bolet recorded for Decca two sonatas by Schubert, Sonata in A minor D784 and the one in this recital D959. He had in fact played Schubert throughout his career, reasonably often at times. In an interview he gave in 1989, he tantalisingly said that he planned to record more Schubert, Mendelssohn and Brahms. (Riccardo Chailly had wanted to do the Brahms concertos with him, though probably only No. 2 - I don't think JB played No. 1)
In his student days and notably in his Naumburg recital in Town Hall New York City 1937, JB often played the rondo from the Sonata in D major, D850. Some Impromptus also appear from time to time, from both sets.
The earliest reference to D959 I've come across is 29 October 1940 (Hofmann Award recital) in Town Hall, New York City , when Jorge was 25.
As early as November 1950 (in San Jacinto High School, Houston, Texas), he was performing Schubert 's great Sonata in B flat D960, and it featured in his recitals throughout the 1950s, but that seems to have been dropped from his repertoire. And of course, he most often played the Fantasy in C Op.15/D760 (Wanderer) - that seems to have been his Schubert calling-card,. The "Trout" Quintet (Forellenquintett), the Piano Quintet in A major, D. 667, also pops up (e.g. with the Juilliard, 1978) - he might even have recorded that with the quartet but for the recording company Sony wanting their "big" pianist of the time to do it (this never happened). In July 1983, in Gramado (Rio Grande do Sul), Brazil, Jorge may even have taken part in a "Trout "with violinist Viktoria Mullova, who had just recently sought asylum in the West, but I'm not sure about this.
Rachmaninoff had been unaware of the late sonatas at the time of Schubert's centenary in 1928.
Ascona is a picturesque, Mediterranean-style town on the shore of Lake Maggiore in Ticino, southern Switzerland.
