Classic Archive: Martha Argerich plays Tchaikovsky & Prokofiev

It's great to see Martha Argerich performing at that time (I believe it was 1977). She had a maturity and technical brilliance that she only improved on over the subsequent decades. She must have played the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto a ton of times over the years, but I hadn't heard her perform the Prokofiev Piano Concerto #3 - that one knocked my socks off! Very demanding technically, and with portions that are quite expressive emotionally. All in all, just very impressive and satisfying to hear and see!

What is it about a Martha Argerich piano performance? I mean there are plenty of well known excellent pianists to be heard,but there is just something special about Argerich.While some flex their "muscles of technique",others still hide from their lack of it behind bringing out "dynamics" to an extreme measure until they literally reach the point of bringing out the insignificant.Martha has stated before that directness should always be the goal in a performance and one should be careful not to sound as if they are "immitating themselves".I know exactly what she means because she never sounds that way.Whenever I hear her play I am struck by the level of emotional "risk" being taken.I get the image of one walking the tightrope while juggling.Her level of musicianship(not simply technique or chops)is truly almost unbelievable.In this DVD which is a series of two performances is one of my all time favorite performances of her of the 3rd Prokofiev concerto.Not that there is anything less than excellent of the Tchaikovsky concerto(especially the beautiful Andantino middle part).I simply like the Prokofiev best.There is just nothing less than poetic fire burning throughout the entire piece.It pains me to try to think of words to describe the effect the music has on me.From start to finish Argerich and the London Symphony Orchestra led by Andre Previn truly achieved something special back in May of 1977.At certain times between diffirent parts you can catch Previn and Argerich glancing at eachother as if to acknowledge the fact that they know everyone's on the same page in the genuine effort by all to treat this masterpiece of a composition by Sergei Prokofiev with all the respect it deserves.I can't imagine a stronger effort being put into that task. Bravo! Martha Argerich is a true hero of mine and this DVD is well worth buying.

If you do not know what a great artist Martha Argerich is, it is not possible to explain this phenomenal artist in a brief review. But it is clear to those of us who have listened to her for decades, that she is one of the great pianists of our time. And if you do know her as an artist you will be familiar with her CD recordings of the Tchaikovsky with Abbado, Kondrashin and Dutoit. All stunning recordings: perhaps even definitive as Gramophone says of her recording of the Tchaikovsky under Abbado. She has also done a marvelous Prokofiev on DGG.So, her talent is not in dispute. But I sometimes think we forget the astonishing technical difficulty of the works we listen to these days and the intensity of focus required of these great performers. Therefore, to see her play these concerti is almost a revelation even for one, like me, who has listened to these works for decades. These performances are brilliantly played by a brilliant artist. There are moments when you listen and watch in disbelief. Her amazing musicality and technique are almost otherworldly.And I think most viewers will be surprised at the orchestral accompanimentand the fine performances of the conductors: Sir Charles Groves and Andre Previn, who has still conducted the best Rachmaninoff Symphony 2 I have ever heard. Of course, as is always the case, such reviews are subjective. But I found the performances to be thrilling. And I very highly recommend this DVD.The video is excellent for its time and the sound is splendid.Do yourself a favor and purchase this DVD. You will not regret a minute of it.

This is a great DVD. Others have commented on the performance. I agree with all of their very positive comments. I will comment on the technical aspects of the DVD. The images are clear with great color saturation. The sound is fine with good frequency range. I particularly liked the fact the the images selected were mostly of Ms Agerich. I thought that there was a nice balance between showing her, the conductor and the orchestra however for virtually the entire time the piano was heard one saw the piano. The camera angle selected showed her hands very clearly.

This is a wonderful video of Argerich playing two fantastic piano concertos. Of the two, her Prokofiev is the outstanding performance.... Just brilliant. The audio quality and video quality are both completely fine, so I am not sure why some people are complaining about that. There is a good balance of camera work on her hands and her face, although at some points one wishes the camera angles were better since in one performance her hair masks her face quite a bit. But that is a small quibble. I have watched it through three times, and it is really great. Highly recommended!

Somehow I got Martha's recording of Prokofiev 3 when I was pretty young and fell in love with it (and her).What I didn't know until kind of recently is that she's a totally fascinating person who is very thoughtful and brilliant. I hate artists that have given no real thought to what their art is: both the aesthetics, and the process. This film shows that Argerich is the antithesis. Saw her perform the 3rd a few years ago in LA. Wow.Great film I will watch again and again..

I have all her four Tchaikovsky recordings. So this is a must-have obviusly. I would say that her touch in this concert is a bit lighter by comparing to any of her recordings. The playing is stunning of course, but the BBC recoded sound is only average. Still, A dvd release recorded in her prime is always welcome.

Absolutely nothing wrong with the music or performances on these DVDs but the quality control on the disks and packaging is not good as others have pointed out.So far I have had 3 sets of these DVD sets from Amazon and in all cases DVD3 "Evening Talks" and DVD5 "Argerich & Barenboim" freeze and judder (DVD5 also makes hideous noises if you try to use skip track or the menu options). I have tried them on multiple players and it is the same on all of them and on my computer one of the disks gave an unreadable error message and gave up before playing anything.Additionally DVDs had broken loose in the case in two sets and were scratched and in one case the plastic teeth holding DVD7 was broken (though in no case was there evidence of damage outside the film wrap).I have now given up on them and requested a refund - Amazon were very helpful and issued a refund instantly and told me not to bother returning the third set.There is an alternative recording of DVD5 at the Berlin Phil available on DVD and BluRay which I shall order but it only contains half of the recital that is meant to be in this set.It is such a pity these issues have not been addressed.5* for the content and Amazon Customer Service2* for the productUpdate: I contacted EuroArts via their website who sent me another set (also faulty). They then sent me a copy of ASIN:B01B8PTG9G (see https://www.amazon.co.uk/At-Teatro-Col%C3%B3n-Editon-DVD/dp/B01B8PTG9G ) which contains the whole recital from DVD5 (in fact it is the same DVD including menus with a different label) in a set with another DVD of Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 1 as part of a West-Eastern Divan Orchestra concert at the same venue. These DVDs work fine - so after 4 dud sets I can finally hear the duo recital without screaming!Thank you EuroArts for fast, very friendly and helpful support.

This set is worthy of 5 stars for the value of musicianship alone (of course it is: this is Martha!). For the current £30 price the value for money is superb.But...yes, there is a but, there are technical issues, expressed in others' reviews. I had the same problem Cineaste referred to with sound and picture freeze-ups.The same ocurred on the replacement set so I guess it's a batch, or permanent fault. Next, the DTS/Dolby 5.1 is not available on several of the discs, although they are stated as being so on the back cover. If you have it, using the old Pro-Logic surround setting on your decoder instead of straight two-channel works well for the Schumann concerto. Although in this case it may be a lucky consequence of crossed-pair miking on the day, in this mode it sounds to me as though there was an intention to produce surround-sound mix in this (excellent) performance, at least.Far more disappointing than this is the ghastly compression that obliterates much of the subtle detail in the Grieg 'cello sonata, for one example. Most of us listening to this quality of music aren't likely to be doing so through little telly speakers so thankfully the problem does not manifest throughout the set. (It could be due to an attempt to 'fix' a sound-level hash in the original engineering -confidence in which is not inspired by the relative 'cello/piano levels in the opening of the same piece). Just a few words about sound compression, in case you are wondering what it is, and why I'm so worked up about it! Compression is a way of processing sounds so the loudest and quietest are made more uniform in volume within a pre-determined range, usually. It enables an apparently higher overall level of output for the final playback or broadcast without the risk of distortion from overloads. This has it's uses, both creatively, and for expediency in sound-level supervision. The down-side is the quiet bits get 'turned up' along with any background noise (like heating or air-con) and the louder bits get 'squashed'. It has, in my opinion, NO place in recording acoustic instrument concerts, certainly of the calibre in this set. If the microphones are positioned well and the levels set properly to begin with, this thing called 'the air' does a very nice job naturally, thank you. The subtleties and nuances don't get obliterated and the music has life and colour.I hope very much that this is only a mastering blunder and we can look forward to a corrected re-release.Please don't let this put you off buying what is, after all, a fine-to-jaw-dropping collection.

Nothing but praise for the contents of this wonderful box set but serious reservations about the encoding of the discs all of which were faulty in my set. They froze about 50 mins into each disc and couldn't be skipped or even ejected until the disc had ground round and round for minutes trying to move on. I tries to contact Euroarts who have no contact details on their website and in desperation i contacted their distributor select who ignored my email. So buyer beware there are faulty sets out there. Keep your receipt you may need it!

is the favorite pianist of my girlfriend: a gift of all to the taste!

The quality is reasonably well and I'm so glad to enjoy the precious moments of Martha.