Beethoven: Piano Concerto No.3 in Cm, (Argerich)

Argerich never produces recordings that are anything less than excellent, but even by her atmospheric standards this recording is unbelievably good. The playing is mercurial and fiery – but there’s also a real sense of integrity to it, and in the middle movement the pianism reaches a trancelike level of concentration. It’s a very Argerich thing, actually, to play in a manner that sounds completely spontaneous while also having every musical decision also make total sense – consider how carefully she varies her trills, for instance: 5:41 (quiet, even), 8:30 (percussive), 14:27 (from forceful to wafer-thin pianissimo), and 26:59 (mechanical, rigid, even a bit frightening). In the first movement, you’ve got the granite-hewn hardness of the piano’s entry put in violent contrast against the expressiveness of the rising chords at 3:28. And immediately after, the melodic lines at 3:37 and 4:17 are presented improvisationally, with dozens of dynamic dips/rises and microscopic changes in tempo. Even a simple thing like the falling arpeggio at 4:07 is given a steely brilliance that lifts it a notch above what you usually hear. The second movement is taken at a really slow tempo, but this works wonders – the ending of the movement seems to stretch to musical infinity, and 20:09 becomes into a moving meditation between piano and winds. And I’ve not heard a better handling of the LH tremolo at 17:17, which here dissolves into a translucent haze of sound. The last movement is taut and combative, filled with jabbing accent, and some surprisingly coy moments (e.g., 28:14, where Argerich plays the alternating high and low phrases very differently: the first rhythmically tight and detached, the second drowsily legato and noticeably slower, with a hair’s-breadth pause between the two). My favourite modulation in all the Beethoven concertos is also handled brilliantly here: the piano cuts off the orchestra mid-sentence at 31:17 by coming in very loud, and with these arrogant agogic accents. And needless to say, the coda is taken at a blistering, reckless speed: 34:24.