
The Romantic Master
Grammy Award
Winner for Best Solo Instrumental Performance (February 26, 1997)
Disk Number:
Sony Classical CD SK 62036, DDD
Contents:
Earl Wild: Virtuoso Piano Transcriptions
Saint-Saens / Wild:
Le Rouet d’Omphale, Op.31
Handel / Wild:
Air and Variations – The Harmonious Blacksmith
Chopin / Wild:
Larghetto, from Piano Concerto No.2 in F minor, Op.21
Rachmaninov / Wild:
Midsummer Nights
Tchaikovsky / Pabst:
Paraphrase on Sleeping Beauty
Fauré / Wild:
Improvisation on Après un Rêve
Bach / Wild:
Hommage à Poulenc
Mozart / Backhaus:
Serenade from Don Giovanni
Churchill / Wild:
Reminiscences of Snow White “Whistle While You Work” – “I’m Wishing” – “One Song” – “Heigh-Ho” – “Someday My Prince Will Come”
Tchaikovsky / Wild:
At the Ball
Tchaikovsky / Wild:
Dance of the Four Swans from Swan Lake
Johann Strauss, Jr. / Tausig:
One Lives but Onceh
Kreisler / Rachmaninov:
Liebesleid
Artists:
Earl Wild piano
Recorded Date:
May 1995 in Fernleaf Abbey, on a Baldwin piano
Producer:
Michael Rolland Davis
Engineer:
Ed Thompson
Piano Technician:
Andrei Svetlichny
When Earl Wild performs, the Golden Age of the keyboard suddenly reappears. Like the great romantic showmen who flourished before World War II, Wild revels in the sensuality and sheer kineticism of the piano, reminding his listeners that it is the only instrument capable of emulating both the tender nuances of vocal music and the thunderous range of the orchestra. When Wild plays, the pallid noodling that often passes for pianism these days vanishes; one hears the grand echoes of Paderewski, Rachmaninov, and Josef Hofmann. Just turning 80, Wild is as productive and more musically rewarding than ever. Sony Classical has just released a new CD, The Romantic Master, which is largely devoted to Wild’s own dazzling transcriptions, among them the delightful “Reminiscences of Snow White,” a fantasy of Frank Churchill’s music for the 1937 Disney animated film.