Ludmila Georgievskaya

Ludmila Georgievskaya

Beethoven Eroica Variations & Schumann Symphonic Etudes

(Odradek)

If ever a recital programme was worth enshrining in CD format, it is this one. All my life I have obssessed about Beethoven's Eroica Symphony, one of the greatest, most dazzling and revolutionary pieces of music ever conceived. And all of my professional life I have wondered why Beethoven's Eroica Variations for piano, using that bass and that theme, dating from several years before the symphony itself, and one of several stopping points on the run in to the revolution sparked by the symphony, hasn't had wider airings or broader appreciation in its own right. I think it's a standalone masterpiece, and clearly, from her light-fingered, unrhetorical and supremely articulate playing, and judging from her convincing performance on this new disc, so does pianist Ludmila Georgievskaya. What a joy is this performance, and what a thrill to hear the developmental links to the great symphony laid bare. And Schumann's great Symphonic Etudes, in this wonderfully characterised performance, are the perfect foil.

Michael Tumelty