Liszt Volume 6 (August 1985)

I had occasion to look again at some reviews of one of my favourite Bolet discs.

Volume 6 of the Decca Liszt series came out in August 1985. It had been recorded on 19-22 October 1983 in Kingsway Hall, London, when Jorge set down Liszt's Années de pèlerinage: Venezia e Napoli S162, Les Jeux d’eau à la Villa d’Este S163/4, Ballade No.2 in B minor S171 and Bénédiction de Dieu dans la solitude S173/3.  Wolfgang Dömling in Die Welt (10 December) stated that in an expansive piece such as Bénédiction, Jorge's grand seigneurial gestures and lyrical cantabile captivated the listener in the music's wide-ranging melodic arches, and he was able to turn everything that was virtuosic into poetry (alles Virtuose in Poesie zu transzendieren).

In the same month, Gramophone's David Fanning commented on Bolet's 'spaciousness in the tone itself' - a more crucial and rarer quality - and said that tempos were judged simply in order to allow each note to speak with maximum eloquence. 'To Bénédiction he brings an embracing warmth and natural grandeur perfectly matched to the sentiments of the poem. His pedalling and rubato are marvels of discretion. The rippling arpeggios of Les Jeux d’eau à la Villa d’Este are brilliantly articulated, rather than impressionistically shaded - Bolet seems unconcerned with its supposed influence on Debussy and Ravel - but in its own terms the interpretation is flawless, and it is crowned in a rich, expensive climax. [But] where Bolet fulminates impressively in the opening of the Ballade, Ervin Nyiregyházi (1903-1987) is positively volcanic.  In short, Bolet sets no great store by the feverish, possessed quality of a certain tradition of Liszt playing.  What he offers instead is nobility, an unforced sense of scale, a warm and consoling lyricism usually suggestive of Schumann, and on LP scarcely less than CD, the most gorgeous piano sound.'