It is a bold pianist who so directly challenges Murray Perahia in this very apt coupling of three Schumann concertante works with piano, but, helped by an exceptionally clean and clear recording from MDG, Christian Zacharias establishes his own distinctive view, in its way as compelling as that of Perahia and Abbado.
As the very forces imply, the first obvious distinction is the one of scale. Zacharias earlier recorded an excellent Mozart coupling with this orchestra, and here with chamber forces directed by the soloist himself the scale is Mozartian, allowing extra transparency of texture, with the crispness of Zacharias’s articulation in rapid passagework a consistent joy, as it was in his Mozart playing.
The very opening of the Piano Concerto also suggests a more classical approach, when the orchestral comment on the soloist’s opening flourish is plainer, more nearly a tempo than one is used to when a separate conductor is in charge. Initially, one may feel the result is too clipped, even stiff, but that is quickly countered in the general responsiveness of the orchestra’s playing.
In that first movement Perahia is more freely rhapsodic throughout, more volatile, yet Zacharias is hardly less poetic in his phrasing. So in the lovely Andante espressivo section of the development in the remote key of A flat, Zacharias is above all fresh and transparent (track 1, 4'28), where Perahia is warmer and more sensuous. With tuttis always incisive, Zacharias is the more urgent in his manner, without ever sounding rushed.
In the slow movement he is again light and fresh, at a flowing Andantino making it more clearly an Intermezzo rather than a full slow movement, where Perahia is again warmer, freer and more poetic at a slightly broader tempo, with Zacharias justifying his broader speed not just with extra clarity, but with crisply sprung rhythms.
In both the other two much rarer works Zacharias adopts speeds rather broader, and though he cannot quite match Perahia in imaginative detail, the lightness of Zacharias’s approach removes any suspicion of pomposity from the wayward writing in Op 134, and makes Op 92 sound the more carefree, if less flam- boyant than with Perahia. Even if the new issue in no way replaces the inspired Perahia disc, it makes a most refreshing alternative, bright and alert. One looks forward to more discs from Zacharias and this fine chamber orchestra