SCHUBERT: Music for Piano, four hands; “Moments...

SCHUBERT: Music for Piano, four hands; “Moments Musicaux” (3 of 6). Sviatoslav Richter and Benjamin Britten, pianos. Music & Arts CD-722. This recording preserves live performances by Britten and Richter from the 1964 and 1965 Aldeburgh Festivals of Schubert’s Variations on an original theme, D. 813; the Fantasy in F minor, D. 940, and the Andantino Varie, D. 823, all for piano four-hands. They are marked by a purposeful and shapely lyricism, sensitive articulation, buoyant rhythmicality, generous detail--in short, by intelligent and communicative playing. Even so, without Britten anchoring him in three of the “Moments Musicaux,” Richter almost succumbs to his own idiosyncrasies. He takes the A-flat Allegretto at a snail’s adagio, for instance, and, coupled with his observance of all of the repeats, it becomes a marathon.