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i just hate his hands, and the way he plays.. He is talented, etc.. but it just seriously bothers and annoys me. his left hand looks so ugly while playing octaves... so bring on the thumbs down.. haha just some word vomit.
This comment has received too many negative votesshow
este pianista se cree que lo que toca es un estudio. Cierto que la sonata requiere una buena técnica, pero hay más cosas interesantes que sacar de esta obra y que este pianista parece desconocer.
I previously only knew this guy as a purveyor of ultra-fast octaves, but the first minute or so is as good as the 20+ recordings I've heard. You can tell that he even thought about the first two notes. One letdown is the passage around 8.30. He loses the beauty of this wonderful passage by playing too fast. Even Barere the speed freak played it slower.
Very good performance.He thinks the work as a whole,cares about tempo proportions, structure(some of his shortening the pauses between sections are not accidental),and often neglects formal beauty,phrasing in octave passages etc.This is what the listeners here can easily notice and what they are ready to criticise,thinking he does not feel music.This is a mature playing,to play this way is obviously his choice.And actually many of his phrasings are very interesting and beautiful.
I'm impressed by the honesty and the insouciante sincerity mixed with respect with which Alexei Grynyuk approaches the grandiose beauty of this unique masterwork. Its refreshing to see.
Man, Liszt was a genius. It just awes me...great interpretation of the song too! I was curious, is he adding notes on the "Grandioso" part (about 3:42 into it? I'm learning the sonata and it looks like he is hitting more than two C notes on that particular part...
I agree. I find the Polonaise itself as a test of stamina, but it pales in comparison to this sonata if one speaks of technique. However, its repetition is what many find as its greatest obstacle.
I have listened to liszt's piano sonata in b minor for years, but have never realized the technical difficulty of the work. I think it parallels his transcendental etudes and paganini etudes in terms of technical difficulty.
I would have to argue and say that Sonata is more techinically difficult than both the transcendental etudes and Paganini etudes.
From what I can see, this piece may be easier than Mazeppa, the 3th Transcendental Etude I'm currently playing, the it takes MUCH MORE endurance to actually play through this whole piece in one sitting. Just playing Mazeppa a few times through taxes me to quite a degree, but playing Sonata all the way through with the quality that this guy shows is incredible
i agree, take some very standard liszt, some of the transcendental and concert studies, you can master at a 10th of the time it would take to learn the sonata, possibly one of the hardest pieces of liszt there is
That's only because they're shorter. Trust me, Feux Follets is quite possibly the hardest thing Liszt ever wrote.
The technical difficulties in this are quite 'standard' if you like... fast left hand stuff, RH arpeggios and passagework (single-line). Feux Follets has everything else. Epic leaps, random passagework that makes no sense (the beginning), and the notorious double-trills in RH (all the time.) And all, nearly all of it pp!
It is a bad interpretetion for me of this great sonate, he is a jocker on the piano...its a robot, a machine a play keys, only that, he is not a musician...
A great friend of mine and wonderful pianist Garrick Ohlsson once told me that if I wanted to hear the most inspirational rendition of this Liszt B Minor Sonata, listen to a pianist that is not well known but does have a CD out. His name is Ernst Levy. He is no longer with us on this earth but his playing will live on. Enjoy!
goodgermanboy, I see from your favorites that you are a pederast. I'm assuming that Garrick is your special friend. Would you rather listen to him play the Liszt Sonata, or get porked up the rear end by him? Ernst Levy was a great pianist and some of his works have been reissued.
I just can't believe none of you mentioned Claudio Arrau's version of the Liszt Sonata. It's by far the most brilliant of all. Wait until you listen to him playing the Grandioso. As per Grynyuk's version, I must admit I started to laugh as I listened to the final arpeggios in the third movement, I wondered if the video was in fast forward.
And I mean the 1971 recording, not the 1982 (Salzburg) recording, which is even slower than the first and a bit overstretched for my taste. The 1971 makes for the definitive version ever recorded in the history of music.
dun forget the mighty K. Zimerman! Pletnev and Pogorelich are really worth listening to, but I really recommend Richter's interpretation of the sonata during his 1965 Carnegie Hall performance
This performance doesn't have heaping portions of depth, but the technique is amazing.
My all-time favorite recording of this piece is by Yundi Li. IMHO, his raw emotional power is unmatched, and his technical brilliance and clarity is right up there with Argerich and Horowitz. It is also the most mature performance I have heard, though by no means have I heard them all.
Not too great sound quality on this one...there is a quite recent post I just found with Per Tengstrand, a Swedish pianist I heard live a few times The video footage is amazing! On CD, Horowitz rules in this piece.
For what it's worth, my favorite performances of this piece are those by Argerich (which is quite amazing throughout) and the old Fleisher recording which has moments that exceed all others for pure, gut-wrenching bravura. Fleisher's performance, in fact, may be a window into understanding his subsequent hand problem; he seems to be slamming the notes down with a pneumatic drill. How lucky we all are to have these great performances to admire..and compare.
As of yet, the two reigning interpreters of this piece for me are Richter and Pollini. Richter's performance is phenomenal, a milestone for pianists, while Pollini's, though it may not be as exhilarating as some (i.e. Richter's), his slow movement passages are truly beautiful and sentimental. I must confess, however, that I have not yet heard Argerich's, but I'm sure she gives Richter a run for his money.
From a musician's perspective, I wouldn't call it copying. It's more of a matter of gaining the perspective of others. These composers had a very unique view on life and were able to communicate it very well through their music. A musician is simply trying to gain these composers experiences through their music while putting themselves into the piece and communicating it to the audience. And also, it's much more difficult these days to successfully become an esteemed composer.
Saying pianists are copying composers' music is like saying actors copy Shakespeare's text in a great staging of Macbeth, and that's ridiculous. Playing (just like acting) includes INTERPRETATION, and that means creativity. Also, don't you ever wonder where would Liszt's music be if Richter, Horowitz, Gillels, Argerich and other great pianists never existed?
incredible, phenomenal octaves but he needs to learn to color things. horowitz wasn't the fastest pianist around but could play as fast and make 4, 5, 6 color-lines at once - and they all said something. he needs to become multi-dimensional.
actually horowitz (whom i love above all other pianists) said he didn't have the best mechanics of any pianist, but he knew how to make it -sound- incredible. if you time his recordings, you'll see that sometimes what sounds like blazing speed is actually not so incredibly fast. of course, his technique was fantastic - rachmaninoff called his octaves colossal.
i only listened to the first 5 minutes so far.. i like his interpretation so far. great passion, a little bit of detail lost due to the speed though (or rather by attempting such a speed rather than the speed itself which is electrifying if you can bring it off), but really splitting hairs here
1:38?
Jerrez 9 months ago
THIS IS ONE OF THE BEST PERFORMANCE I'VE EVER HEARD OF THIS PIECE.
ACCURATE,GOOD TEMPO AND WITH BALLS.
bazzatt1 10 months ago 4
A bit too wild for my taste, my old times favorites are Mephisto W and Liszt Transendental Etude "feux follets".
ym42ym42 11 months ago
very well manvery nice
bethanylovesdan 1 year ago
very well man
bethanylovesdan 1 year ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
i just hate his hands, and the way he plays.. He is talented, etc.. but it just seriously bothers and annoys me. his left hand looks so ugly while playing octaves... so bring on the thumbs down.. haha just some word vomit.
davidbaker03 2 years ago
1:38 XD
massimiliano123123 2 years ago 14
This comment has received too many negative votes show
este pianista se cree que lo que toca es un estudio. Cierto que la sonata requiere una buena técnica, pero hay más cosas interesantes que sacar de esta obra y que este pianista parece desconocer.
malditocalvo 2 years ago
I previously only knew this guy as a purveyor of ultra-fast octaves, but the first minute or so is as good as the 20+ recordings I've heard. You can tell that he even thought about the first two notes. One letdown is the passage around 8.30. He loses the beauty of this wonderful passage by playing too fast. Even Barere the speed freak played it slower.
whatsmylogin 2 years ago 4
Very good performance.He thinks the work as a whole,cares about tempo proportions, structure(some of his shortening the pauses between sections are not accidental),and often neglects formal beauty,phrasing in octave passages etc.This is what the listeners here can easily notice and what they are ready to criticise,thinking he does not feel music.This is a mature playing,to play this way is obviously his choice.And actually many of his phrasings are very interesting and beautiful.
clsrp 2 years ago 21
I'm impressed by the honesty and the insouciante sincerity mixed with respect with which Alexei Grynyuk approaches the grandiose beauty of this unique masterwork. Its refreshing to see.
stlivermore 2 years ago 26
Wonderful Interpretation!
Where's the Zymerman's interpretation? I don't find it..
MetalNicola 2 years ago 11
muito bem!
studio1320 2 years ago 6
For a hungarian its hard to understand the story, the fight between the good and bad. He plays very good though.He plays Liszt very good.
konzolmester 3 years ago 2
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What a shame..so much Velocity and virtuose but no meaning... Still he plays Rhapsody 6 very accurate.
konzolmester 3 years ago
wqw
mindxxi 3 years ago
Man, Liszt was a genius. It just awes me...great interpretation of the song too! I was curious, is he adding notes on the "Grandioso" part (about 3:42 into it? I'm learning the sonata and it looks like he is hitting more than two C notes on that particular part...
WriterOfCrime 3 years ago 2
he is a piano player who was born to play liszt
relaxanimal 3 years ago 7
This comment has received too many negative votes show
Try to listen to Heroic Polonaise by Chopin. And try to look at the sheet of it. T'is the impossible.
wkk94 3 years ago
It´s requaries technic but not harder then this or impossible
addeex1 3 years ago
I agree. I find the Polonaise itself as a test of stamina, but it pales in comparison to this sonata if one speaks of technique. However, its repetition is what many find as its greatest obstacle.
EinSofVirtuoso 3 years ago
Superb!!!
Anders039 3 years ago
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i have just recently started learning this piece, and wow he missed ALOT of notes!! ya he plays the octaves fast, but rather sloppily
davidbaker03 3 years ago
Damn you suck.
Anders039 3 years ago 4
I love his Hungarian Rhapsody no. 6, but this? I have to say he played without much understanding of the music
ugolinoandhissons 3 years ago
Ok, let's hear your version!
Anders039 3 years ago 4
thats what she said
laqin007 3 years ago
argerich version is also great
byokiyasumi 3 years ago 2
yea, what he said!!!!!!
Mudhauler68 4 years ago 2
I have listened to liszt's piano sonata in b minor for years, but have never realized the technical difficulty of the work. I think it parallels his transcendental etudes and paganini etudes in terms of technical difficulty.
chopinandliszt 4 years ago
I would have to argue and say that Sonata is more techinically difficult than both the transcendental etudes and Paganini etudes.
From what I can see, this piece may be easier than Mazeppa, the 3th Transcendental Etude I'm currently playing, the it takes MUCH MORE endurance to actually play through this whole piece in one sitting. Just playing Mazeppa a few times through taxes me to quite a degree, but playing Sonata all the way through with the quality that this guy shows is incredible
michaelkid13 4 years ago 2
i agree, take some very standard liszt, some of the transcendental and concert studies, you can master at a 10th of the time it would take to learn the sonata, possibly one of the hardest pieces of liszt there is
callanmchugh 3 years ago
That's only because they're shorter. Trust me, Feux Follets is quite possibly the hardest thing Liszt ever wrote.
The technical difficulties in this are quite 'standard' if you like... fast left hand stuff, RH arpeggios and passagework (single-line). Feux Follets has everything else. Epic leaps, random passagework that makes no sense (the beginning), and the notorious double-trills in RH (all the time.) And all, nearly all of it pp!
Haeronthegreat 3 years ago
grande tecnica poca musica.
ottave paurose!!
irragno 4 years ago
It is a bad interpretetion for me of this great sonate, he is a jocker on the piano...its a robot, a machine a play keys, only that, he is not a musician...
Karlstuart 4 years ago
140 his fixed his shirt
bethanylovesdan 4 years ago
o my god...is all i can say ...i dream of playing like that
virtuoso18 4 years ago
his hands look like spiders.
jtsnowman66 4 years ago
A great friend of mine and wonderful pianist Garrick Ohlsson once told me that if I wanted to hear the most inspirational rendition of this Liszt B Minor Sonata, listen to a pianist that is not well known but does have a CD out. His name is Ernst Levy. He is no longer with us on this earth but his playing will live on. Enjoy!
goodgermanboy18 4 years ago
goodgermanboy, I see from your favorites that you are a pederast. I'm assuming that Garrick is your special friend. Would you rather listen to him play the Liszt Sonata, or get porked up the rear end by him? Ernst Levy was a great pianist and some of his works have been reissued.
mrcatalan3 4 years ago
I just can't believe none of you mentioned Claudio Arrau's version of the Liszt Sonata. It's by far the most brilliant of all. Wait until you listen to him playing the Grandioso. As per Grynyuk's version, I must admit I started to laugh as I listened to the final arpeggios in the third movement, I wondered if the video was in fast forward.
pecdr 4 years ago
And I mean the 1971 recording, not the 1982 (Salzburg) recording, which is even slower than the first and a bit overstretched for my taste. The 1971 makes for the definitive version ever recorded in the history of music.
pecdr 4 years ago
I have listened different people playing this pieces including Horowitz and Brendel and I think Argerich's sonata in b minor is surely the best~!
ben5450 4 years ago
dun forget the mighty K. Zimerman! Pletnev and Pogorelich are really worth listening to, but I really recommend Richter's interpretation of the sonata during his 1965 Carnegie Hall performance
668JunKi 4 years ago
This performance doesn't have heaping portions of depth, but the technique is amazing.
My all-time favorite recording of this piece is by Yundi Li. IMHO, his raw emotional power is unmatched, and his technical brilliance and clarity is right up there with Argerich and Horowitz. It is also the most mature performance I have heard, though by no means have I heard them all.
McChucklemeister 4 years ago
@ paolohudson:
you go to altavista, then mp3/audio, and then you search for sonatabma. that's Argerich's performance.
lepiffou 4 years ago
Not too great sound quality on this one...there is a quite recent post I just found with Per Tengstrand, a Swedish pianist I heard live a few times The video footage is amazing! On CD, Horowitz rules in this piece.
LizofSweden 4 years ago
For what it's worth, my favorite performances of this piece are those by Argerich (which is quite amazing throughout) and the old Fleisher recording which has moments that exceed all others for pure, gut-wrenching bravura. Fleisher's performance, in fact, may be a window into understanding his subsequent hand problem; he seems to be slamming the notes down with a pneumatic drill. How lucky we all are to have these great performances to admire..and compare.
cziffra11 4 years ago
As of yet, the two reigning interpreters of this piece for me are Richter and Pollini. Richter's performance is phenomenal, a milestone for pianists, while Pollini's, though it may not be as exhilarating as some (i.e. Richter's), his slow movement passages are truly beautiful and sentimental. I must confess, however, that I have not yet heard Argerich's, but I'm sure she gives Richter a run for his money.
paolohudson 4 years ago
Argerich is maybe the only pianist, who plays it almost the way Liszt would play it himself.
lepiffou 4 years ago
Too loud and hard tone. But great technique.
maxi937 4 years ago
Actually, Argerich plays this sonata far better than everyone (even Horowitz I believe) !
PHILBXL 4 years ago
i dont like pianist as much as composers. Its a lot easier to just copy people than to come up with ur own stuff. Lisz and beethoven RuLe
lordlactose 4 years ago
From a musician's perspective, I wouldn't call it copying. It's more of a matter of gaining the perspective of others. These composers had a very unique view on life and were able to communicate it very well through their music. A musician is simply trying to gain these composers experiences through their music while putting themselves into the piece and communicating it to the audience. And also, it's much more difficult these days to successfully become an esteemed composer.
paolohudson 4 years ago
Saying pianists are copying composers' music is like saying actors copy Shakespeare's text in a great staging of Macbeth, and that's ridiculous. Playing (just like acting) includes INTERPRETATION, and that means creativity. Also, don't you ever wonder where would Liszt's music be if Richter, Horowitz, Gillels, Argerich and other great pianists never existed?
ntnkj 4 years ago 2
WOW...
2exx 4 years ago
incredible, phenomenal octaves but he needs to learn to color things. horowitz wasn't the fastest pianist around but could play as fast and make 4, 5, 6 color-lines at once - and they all said something. he needs to become multi-dimensional.
kasyapa 4 years ago
actually Horowitz always had the fastest octaves...
MJGriftz 4 years ago
actually horowitz (whom i love above all other pianists) said he didn't have the best mechanics of any pianist, but he knew how to make it -sound- incredible. if you time his recordings, you'll see that sometimes what sounds like blazing speed is actually not so incredibly fast. of course, his technique was fantastic - rachmaninoff called his octaves colossal.
kasyapa 4 years ago
Good technique. He needs to relax a little bit. The fast parts are a lot more effective with shaping and rubato.
ILUVDUX69 4 years ago
This guy is fantastic!
vivace119 4 years ago
i only listened to the first 5 minutes so far.. i like his interpretation so far. great passion, a little bit of detail lost due to the speed though (or rather by attempting such a speed rather than the speed itself which is electrifying if you can bring it off), but really splitting hairs here
englishphil38 4 years ago
It's Liszt, not the Pimlico.
iamahab2 5 years ago
yes it is
iamahab2 5 years ago
Wat a pianist!! cant say anything else!
tristansmusic 5 years ago
hahaha rezpec
imawsome13 5 years ago
hahahahahahahaha his octaves are fast but his runs arent. In my humble opinion mines better
imawsome13 5 years ago
ahahahah ma guezz iz hiz octavez r faztah den yo runz
datruzepp 5 years ago
Pretty good, I have heard it performed better. But, he is very good. I can't wait till I can play this well. Good job! One of my favorites.
vocalpianist 5 years ago
is this in the same place as that prokofiev toccata video also on youtube?
crimbo912 5 years ago
ahahahah n randomly rezpec da SD zuit adjuztment at 1'38 tru
datruzepp 5 years ago
pull your pants up*HOMIE*
shineshocker 5 years ago
ahahahah correctly!!
datruzepp 5 years ago
Grynyuk...
This guy is awesome!
His technique is sublime!
Is octaves are faster than Argerich's!
OMG!
nekic 5 years ago