I recently bought the RCA Victor Gold Seal CD "Rachmaninoff Plays Chopin". I decided to write a review of the CD. Here are my comments:

This CD was made by re-recording 78 records that Rachmaninoff made between 1919 and 1925. It includes the Sonata in B flat minor, No 2; Ballade No. 3, Scherzo No. 3, and a selection of Nocturnes, Mazurkas and Waltzes. The engineers have done a very good job to reduce the noise from the 78 recording. It is noticeable at times, but the greatness of Rachmaninoff''s playing shines through.

Rachmaninoff's playing of the 2nd sonata is by far my favourite interpretation. There is tremendous drama, passion, excitement in this performance. He had a wonderful way of making the piano sing, and by shaping the phrases. The beautiful cantabile melodic section in the 2nd movement following the energetic introduction is an excellent example of this. He had a very wide dynamic range from the quietest pianissimo to the loudest fortissimo. He sometimes comes unstuck in the fast sections of the sonata striking wrong notes at the top of the keyboard It shows that he was a "human" pianist.

The funeral march is taken at a faster tempo that I have usually heard before. After the cantabile middle scction, he plays the march again fortissimo, which I haven't heard before, and was very effective. The finale again was different from all the other interpretations I have heard. Instead of creating a foggy, ghostly atmosphere, it sounds more like a raging sea, and very agitato. He added a couple of measures at the end that were not written by Chopin.

In the 3rd ballade, I thought his playing sounded very similar to the way Vladimir Horowitz would play this. He take the fast parts at tremendous speed. I wonder whether he was having an off day because there were several places with many wrong notes especially in the finale. The overall effect was great though.

I guess that in the 1920's there were no modern techniques for editing and joining parts of different performances together, so a recording had to be made "as is". There are some other recordings that are fast technically difficult (eg Waltz in E minor Op post.) and they are note perfect and quite incredible. He must have had an off day here and there. There is no doubt he had a phenomenal technique. I wish I could have hear him playing live.

He seemed to like altering a composition here and there to add enhancements. Listen to the minute waltz (2 different versions so you can hear how the interpretation changed over the years) just before the recapitulation, and you will here some altered notes (grace notes). I think it sounds different, maybe a little bizarre. In the Grande Valse Brilliante in E flat he add some repeated notes in an inner voice that produce a "fanfare-like" effect. I believe I have heard Vladimir Horowitz and Artur Rubinstein do similar things in this piece. Another example is in the Waltz in G flat major, Op 70 No. 1 where he adds an elaborate (and fairly sentimental) couple of phrases.

I don't know what the rationale was for altering a composer's score and adding "enhancement". It seems that several pianists at the turn of the century did this.

In the 3rd Scherzo, I felt his playing was a little eccentric, especially the strange dotted rhythms he gave the octaves. The chordal melody accompanied by the choral cascading down from the top of the keyboard was exquisite though, quite heavenly.

I would like to listen to some more of his recordings to find out how he interpreted other composers. This CD was very enlightening and I encourage Rachmaninoff and Chopin fans to get this CD and see what you think about it.

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