Lugansky - Brahms Piano Concerto No. 1

Johannes Brahms (1833 – 1897)
Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op. 15 (1858)
Nikolai Lugansky, soloist
Alexander Rudin conducting Russian National Youth Symphony Orchestra, March 2022
Moscow Philharmonic Society

I.
[0:00] Expos. - Theme 1 (Maestoso)
[4:00] Expos. - Solo entrance
[6:54] Expos. - Theme 2 (Poco più moderato)
[11:10] Dev. (Tempo I)
[14:30] Recap. - Theme 1
[17:36] Recap. - Theme 2 (Poco più moderato)
[21:38] Coda (Tempo I poco più animato)

II.
[23:35] A (Adagio)
[28:33] B
[30:09] A’ (- molto espr. dolce 31:31)
[34:14] Coda (Cadenza ad lib.)

III. Rondo
[36:13] A1/B1 (Allegro non troppo)
[39:21] A2/B2
[41:25] C (w/ Fugato)
[43:10] A3/B3
[44:27] Cadenza quasi Fantasia
[45:50] Coda B/A (a tempo - a brilliant transition 47:19 - Più animano 47:30)

"Brahms's piano concertos are two of the greatest pillars of the Romantic repertoire. The first, written in 1858 when the composer was still a young man, is like a symphony where piano and orchestra seem involved at times in a titanic struggle, themes are hurled across the stage with dramatic rhetoric; the second, composed two decades later, feels more like a massive chamber work, where the musical ideas are an exchange rather than a confrontation. If the first is more about proclamation, the second is perhaps more about reception - a speaker versus a listener. The way each piece opens tells this story in a few seconds: the first with its ferocious drum roll, a clap of D minor thunder pinning the audience back in its seats; the second with a gentle horn solo inviting that same audience to lean forward in dialogue.”

- Stephen Hough

[Ermine]

Nikolai Lugansky changed me, my life. Maestro ❤

[geraldinetaylor]

Nikolai is such a fantastic pianist and makes this glorious concerto sound so beautiful. I think Brahms must have been basically a happy person as his music always lifts my spirits whatever it is. His symphonies are all wonderful, difficult to say which I like best but the piano concertos are exquisite.

[motivation_interesa]

Прекрасная музыка ! Прекрасныйпианист! Бравво музыканты!!!

[emmegy]

Absolutly my prefered composition, a great masterpiece, if I must save an opera in the world, I would save this concert , I love Brahms for ever, his music is armonia and peace, my mind is completly in a great dream!!

[wzuccking]

Incredible performance for this piano concerto!

[theingabo]

My favourite pianist plays my favourite concerto! What can I ask for more?

[kettynez]

Wonderful to see/hear the young generation exploring Brahms' universe under maestro Rudin, 'walking alongside' a luminary such as Lugansky!

[danielalaura]

Luganski i njegov predivan ton!Orkestar sjajan!Bravo!❤️👏👏💐💐

[adelphe]

Je ne suis presque pas étonnée que Lugansky soit à ce point merveilleux, bien que c’est à chaque fois une découverte car une nouvelle œuvre. Mais l’orchestre ! Extraordinaire, profond, un son d’ensemble sublime.

[bratschenk]

Great rendition of the opening of the 2nd movement. On par with all the greatest pianists ever alive.

[antoniocoppola]

La scuola pianistica russa è talmente difficile, laboriosa e profonda da rasentare la perfezione e quando un/una pianista riesce a emergere, il mondo può godere il sommo privilegio di trovarsi di fronte a qualcosa di veramente trascendentale.

[brettaspivey]

Hooray! I have been wishing for Nikolai to do this for a long time!! This might be the best ever Brahms 1!

[k-bn]

An excellent performance. What else can show better that we all share one world culture, in this case, a joint European culture. It must feel very painful to those musicians who have dedicated their lives to nothing but perfecting their play, their instruments and their music, Russians playing a German composer in Moscow, to see that many in Europe are treating them as 'non-Europeans' - despite the fact that they have zero input into politics. Cui bono?
I am so grateful that they continue to share their art with the rest of the world.

[wolfgangklofat]

Immer profilierter und deutlicher entwickelt sch dieser Pianist weltweit zur Nummer 1. Hier gelingt es ihm beeindruckend, sich in das Noten-Gewand dieses großen Werks von Johannes Brahms zu begeben. Stets bleibt sein Spiel in tiefer Einfühlung und Erfassung nur auf dessen Charakter bedacht, und er bringt somit die vertrackte lyrisch-bizzarre Klangwelt des Komponisten zum Leuchten - vermeidet dabei jegliches Sich-Exaltieren und Sich-in-Szene-Setzen, um erst an den gebotenen Stellen seine integrierte Virtuosität auszuspielen. - Herzlichen Glückwunsch nach Russland zum 50. Gbeurtstag!

[mgorshkoff]

I had an opportunity to be on this concert. In fact, on both, there were two of them during one week in two different halls in Moscow. Both times perfect. The second part of the concert was devoted to Schumann’s third symphony, if I’m not mistaken. Quite good as well. I was so excited I even bought a program booklet to remember

[andreapandypetrapan]

Thank you maestro NL for this dazzlingly mature and technically ravishing performance... and to the band of dedicated young orchestral players, under Alexander Rudin's baton.

Brahms is on of those few truly adult, titanic yet humanist composers (Bach, Handel, Wagner) who leave one with an elevated and expanded vision of what humanity can achieve and grasp.

In my female heart I call her Joanna Brahms, because there is a lot of more characteristically womanly balance in this romantic yet sophisticated yet life-celebratory yet objective-realistic, and sometimes soberly melancholic comprehension. Often polished into an exquisite exercise in heart-melting and heat-breaking intensity. Always expressed with a stunning formal and developmental grasp, worthy of Bach and Mozart and later Beethoven at their best.

A mixture of Athena, Apollo, Dionysus, and Mercurial brilliance, yet with a more Nordic sense of the impermanence of even the most kaleidoscopic of our womanly-creative powers. In time even we and our endless generations of daughters will fade from reality into nothingness. See especially her Clarinet Quintette and the Horn Trio.

As Wagner knew most completely, there are many things expressed and encapsulated in music, especially drawn from our subconscious psyches, that cannot be written in our everyday natural languages. But there is a lot in JB's music redolent of .... walking round the south side of Hyde Park, in and out of the formal flower beds, in the autumn, each holding the hand of the other beloved woman. Perhaps saying nothing yet feeling everything implicitly. Perhaps laughing and kissing and discussing the matters of everyday sisterhood. Yet with our psyches swept over by the bitter-sweet melancholy of autumnal leaves and colours in the breeze and fading evening sunlight. Perhaps we are thinking of a picture by Ethel Gabain, depicting homeless families bombed-out in Bermondsey in


Love andrea

[tgunersel]

The slowest performance I have heard - and enjoyed it a lot :)

[claudiaochoacruz]

Bellísimo!! Muchas gracias por compartirlo!! :) :)

[noemiserra]

M'agrada molt en Nikolai. No és brusc tocant i té molt sentiment. Sent el què toca.

[ThomasOgrodnik]

13:25 Leading to the best part of the whole concerto