I'm sure RL will be as glad as I to find that he was unduly pessimistic, just under four years ago, in predicting that ''it would be a long time before we can expect the Compact Disc catalogue to include'' the breathtaking recordings made by Simon Barere for HMV in the mid-1930s; for here they are, as stunning in their impact, dazzling in their virtuosity and gossamer in their delicacy as ever. For those who still haven't come across this phenomenal but ill-fated pianist—technically in the same class as Horowitz, and an artist of great perception and nobility—a revelation awaits them. I still remember being knocked all of a heap in 1936 by Barere's Islamey when it was first issued; and this, a gripping performance of Liszt's Don Juan fantasy, an eloquent Petrarch Sonnet 104, a deeply poetic reading of Scriabin's C sharp minor Etude, a crystalline ''Gnomenreigen'' taken at an astonishing speed, and unbelievable left-hand-only pyrotechnics in an Etude by his teacher Blumenfeld (who also taught Horowitz) are among the highlights of the HMV collection.
Barere undertook ten sessions altogether, and all the takes, including alternatives (some substituted, at the artist's insistence, even after records had first been released), are here, meticulously documented by Bryan Crimp, who also supervised the transfers and provided exemplary presentation material. There are in fact two more recordings here than on the LPs (which I reviewed in 12/85) in the shape of a Schumann Toccata and a Chopin Mazurka which seem to have been initially issued in error: in the case of the latter I actually prefer the 'rogue' version as being less pulled about, though the heavy surface noise is a drawback. Only in the Valse oubliee and the Chopin Waltz does Barere succumb to the temptation of excessive speed.
Any suspicions that his fantastic fingerdexterity was in some way 'helped' by recording trickery are immediately dispelled by the new two-disc set of recordings taken live from five recitals in Carnegie Hall between 1946 and 1949. These were made privately, out of sight of the hall itself, on acetate discs: the surface noise (despite great care in the transfer process) and occasional distortion cannot be denied, but Barere's performances transcend such flaws, and, to be honest, the unrestrained coughing of the New York audiences (however ecstatic their reception of his playing) is infinitely more disturbing. There is, perhaps unexpectedly, a fine and strong, if emotional, performance of the Beethoven Op. 90 Sonata (the slow movement notable for its beautiful quiet control) and an extremely interesting Carnaval with a tender ''Valse noble'', a lovely capricious ''Coquette'', a featherweight ''Florestan'', a ''Chopin'' that is meditative rather than agitato, but also some slips and an unnecessarily rushed ''Preambule''.
The restraint Barere usually shows, as for instance in the simple lyricism he brings to the Andante spianato and the poetic delicacy and strength of the attached Polonaise, occasionally deserts him at moments of excitement, and there are splashy endings both to this work and the Weber perpetuum mobile. But listen to the finger control in ''La leggierezza'', the imaginative and brilliant G minor Ballade, the contemplative and poetic Nocturne, the purity and charm of the A flat Impromptu and the grasp of large-scale structure in the F minor Fantasie (the surface here really bad, unfortunately), and I think you may echo RL's words that ''no superlative is strong enough adequately to convey the quality of this playing''.'