piano: Earl Wild orchestra: Florida Philharmonic Orchestra conductor: Larry Newland Producer: Michael Rolland Davis Engineer: Ed Thompson Piano: Baldwin Original Engineer: Peter McGrath
Liner Notes: James E. Frasier Design: Samskara, Inc.
The three pieces presented on this CD were written by composers whose lives together span the entire length of the Romantic period, beginning with Carl Maria von Weber (1786-1826), who flourished at the outset of the era, continuing with Franz Liszt (1811-1886) who was born fifteen years before Weber died, and ending with Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943) who was born thirteen years before Liszt died, and whose work constitutes the last flower of Russian Romanticism. All three composers were also extraordinary pianists, equipping them the better to compose idiomatically for the instrument and exploit its most extreme subtleties. Each had very large hands as well. Moreover, all three composed their piano works for their own use on stage, and all three were conductors. Through their overlapping years, and their influence upon each other, we thus have a representative span outlining the great period of Romantic piano concertos from Germany, Hungary, and Russia. The three pieces in question, composed in 1821, 1852, and 1909, in vastly different styles, amply display the range of writing that we know as Romantic and give us a fair sampling of the Romantic piano and its orchestra.
