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Rachmaninov
for Violin and Piano

Hideko Udagawa, violin
Konstantin Lifschitz, piano

BBC Music Magazine, February 2010
Recording ****
Performance - *****

A pupil of Nathan Milstein, Hideko Udagawa retains the Master’s nobility throughout a programme of Rachmaninov transcriptions centered on Mikhailovsky’s skilful adaptation of the Cello Sonata.

Julian Haylock

The Strad, March 2010

Violinist Hideko Udagawa brings together a fine clutch of Rachmaninoff transcriptions – by Heifetz and Kreisler, among others – as well as the composer’s original Romance in A minor. Viktor Mikhailovsky’s new transcription of the Cello Sonata op.19 makes a nicely long-drawn opening, with Udagawa bringing a rich, almost viola-like tone to its brooding Romanticism and Konstantin Lifschitz making light work of the piano’s virtuosic ruminations. Udagawa has a real feel for Rachmaninoff’s delicate expressive nuances, but the effect is let down slightly by very audible position changes in the slower passages, surely more than is stylistically necessary. She also has a strange tic of altering her tuning very slightly when a note is repeated.

This said, her bell-like clarity of tone in the upper reaches of Daisies (transcr. Kreisler) is incredibly persuasive, as is her capable handling of its scampering runs. The Étude-tableau op.33 no.7 (transcr. Heifetz) is equally finely judged, with fireworks aplenty, and the Vocalise (transcr. Press) is soaring and lovely, delicately phrased by both players. The effervescent flights of fancy of the fiendish Danse hongroise op.6 no.2 bring the disc to a shimmering close.

The recording balance is perfect, the violin never clouded by the density of the piano part, and the sound is brilliant and true.

Catherine Nelson

International Record Review, February 2010

On paper, the notion of a disc of Rachmaninov’s music in versions arranged by other hands for violin and piano is not, in essence, such a bad one, but it cannot be said that this disc is entirely successful in such an aim. This is because of a number of endemic drawbacks to the project. The first is that while we may accept without demur Cesar Franck’s Violin Sonata in versions for cello and for flute, the arranging of music inherently composed with the lower instrument in mind does not readily transcribe well in essence to the higher register. This is not really the place to go into the musical and musicological reasons as to why this is so, but anyone experienced in Rachmaninov’s Cello Sonata will soon appreciate that one needs also to rewrite much of the piano part, which - in the case of this composer - borders on the absurd. In short, this 2005 transcription by Viktor Mikhailovsky simply des not work well in practice; it might have made a greater effect if the recorded balance had favoured the violin more or if Hideko Udagawa (who is a fine artist) played with greater depth of tone and greater emotional commitment in such late-Romantic music.

The violinist’s inherently refined interpretive character is more suited to the shorter pieces, almost all of which are more convincing in their transcribed forms than the Cello Sonata. Yet one has to report that such inherently pianistic pieces as the two Etudes-tableaux from Op. 33 do not work entirely convincingly in this form, despite Heifetz’s advocacy, and even the beautiful melodic line of the G major Prelude is understated in comparison with the fulsome pianism of Konstantin Lifschitz. Perhaps the recorded balance is at fault, but I also found it quite frustrating to note that of Rachmaninov’s three original works for violin and piano, only two are included here, when there is ample space left over for the their (the first of the Op. 6 pieces) to have been included. If my comments thus far appear overly critical I should say that the real interest in this CD is the world premiere recording of one of those original works - the 1889 Romance: it is very beautifully played by both artists and alone is worth the price of the disc. Rachmaninov enthusiasts will need no second bidding to acquire this CD for the sake of this hitherto unknown original study from the composer’s maturity.

If, overall, the result is a disc of mainly intermittent interest, the high competence of the playing and the high competence of the playing and the valuable inclusion of the Romance earn it a recommendation.

Robert Matthew-Walker

Fanfare Magazine, May 2010

Hideko Udagawa’s collection (with pianist Boris Berezovsky) of compositions by Aram Khachaturian (Koch 7571, Fanfare 27:3) included the Violin Sonata, as well as arrangements of Khachaturian’s short pieces made by Heifetz, Mostras, Khachaturian himself, and by Viktor Mikhailovsky. Udagawa has returned to Mikhailovsky for arrangements of works by Sergei Rachmaninoff (in this program, only the Romance and the Danse hongroise appear to have been originally written for the violin), including his Cello Sonata, op. 19. It may be no coincidence that Udagawa studied with Nathan Milstein, who, like Heifetz, enriched the literature of his instrument with many effectively wrought transcriptions.

Udagawa’s program opens with the Cello Sonata; in her prefatory comments to the booklet’s notes, she mentions that she had earlier felt that the Andante of that work “sounded very well” on the violin, leading her to request that Mikhailovsky transcribe the sonata for her. She plays the first movement with a manner and tone recalling, in both strength and richness, the instrument for which Rachmaninoff conceived the sonata, and Konstantin Lifschitz matches these attributes on the piano. If her expressive gestures accordingly seem bigger than life (or if occasional roughness or strain mark the climactic passages), her overall large-scale playing still seems appropriate in this transcription. The gnomic Scherzo sounds similarly several sizes larger (even in the lyrical passages) than that of an original violin sonata in her affecting reading. The third movement, the inspiration for Udagawa’s transcription project, bears the expected weight in her reading. The duo whips the finale into a frenzy.

By contrast with the sonata, the Romance, an original work (Udagawa’s notes mention it having been edited by Louis Persinger), doesn’t call forth such super-sized tone production and gesticulation, but she infuses its simpler melodic design with insinuating nuance. The Danse orientale, sumptuously suggestive in her reading, builds through its middle section in harmonic as well as in melodic fervor. Daisies, op. 38/3, the Études-Tableaux, op. 33/7 and op. 33/2, the Prelude, op. 32/5, and the Melody, op. 21/9, appear here in Heifetz’s arrangements. While Heifetz played Daisies with soaring complexity (he included it on his TV appearance in 1971), Udagawa explores most effectively the greater viscosity of her lower registers. The brief etudes in these performances sound chunkily energetic (though without Heifetz’s razor-sharp precision in the double-stops) in op. 33/7 and searingly lyrical in op. 33/2. The Prelude and Melody maintain a lower profile in these performances, though Udagawa plays them with heartfelt grace. In the Oriental Sketch, Udagawa produces a great deal of excitement but, concurrently, a bit of tonal roughness. The Vocalise, one of Rachmaninoff’s most familiar melodies, appears as a highlight of Udagawa’s collection in her melodically straightforward yet timbrally ingratiating performance, enhanced by judicious portamentos—a downward one toward the end sounds eerily reminiscent of her teacher, Milstein. A dashing, sonorous, Gypsy-like performance of the original Danse hongroise brings the recital to a boffo conclusion.

The sonata and the Romance, of which the notes indicate Udagawa’s performances to be premiere recordings (along with the Danse orientale), seem like significant contributions to the violin’s literature as well as, in these sympathetic performances, to the violin’s discography. Signum’s recorded sound presents a vibrant if somewhat reverberant portrait of the instruments, and a thrillingly close-up representation of Udagawa’s tone. Generally recommended for all types of collections.

Robert Maxham