As with most volumes in this series there are some performances here which demanded inclusion for their unique features, and others which may not be so special but which still help to round out our picture of the artist.
Above all, the obligatory inclusions are the Prokofiev First Concerto and Romeo and Juliet pieces. Gavrilov launches into the concerto with tremendous dash and verve, takes all the corners hair-raisingly on two wheels, yet somehow still finds room for the most delicious rhythmic pointing and colouring. No less breathtaking is the range of character and sheer agility he brings to the ballet transcriptions; others have excelled in individual pieces, but no one, I think, has ever hit such an unerring succession of bull’s-eyes.
Scarcely less fine are the other Russian works. The Scriabin Sonata No. 4 is at once authentically febrile and bafflingly articulate; Gavrilov may be on the border of hitting through the sound, but only because he is transported as the music demands the player to be. The most gorgeous of Scriabin’s studies has a fine sweep and sensitivity too, and the heavy torpor of the Rachmaninov Moments musicaux and the elegance of the Tchaikovsky Variations are nicely captured. Gavrilov’s Islamey is justly famous, though I do find its clamorous virtuosity excessive and one-sided.
Somewhat remarkably, given his image as a firebrand, Gavrilov’s Bach is a model of good taste and style; it can stand comparison with the finest. Probably his Handel can too, but here the airless, constricted recording quality lets him down. At the opposite extreme his Mozart is rather too swimmily recorded and somewhat facelessly played, and although there are remarkable colours in his Schumann they sometimes substitute for genuine insight into musical character.
A mixed bag, then, but with at least an hour’s worth of phenomenal pianism.'