Piano Concerto, 1, : Andsnes(P)Rattle / City Of Birmingham So

With this recording of Brahms' First Piano Concerto, conductor Simon Rattle scores another triumph with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. In his tenure as music director, he has lifted this orchestra to world-class heights. Rattle and pianist Leif Ove Andsnes bring to the concerto a reading which highlights its Romantic breadth and sweep, yet allows the work's debts to Beethoven and Schumann to show. Andsnes handles the work's pianistic challenges--great in scale without resorting to empty virtuosity--with grace and ease, and Rattle provides strong yet sensitive support. Although the outer movements are splendidly executed, the Adagio in particular is given a special lightness of touch which allows it to unfold with breathtaking beauty.
The Concerto began as a two-piano sonata, which Brahms attempted to transform into a symphonic work without piano before eventually settling on a concerto of symphonic proportions. Brahms' solo piano works have some of the same fire as his orchestral pieces, but more often resemble the intimacy of the middle movement of the First Concerto. Andsnes' performance of the three Op. 117 Intermezzi brings the disc to a tender and quiet close.