A pianist beyond comparison, by Bryce Morrison

Sviatoslav Richter's name appears at the head of virtually everyone's shortlist of great pianists. The legend commenced, then gathered force, during the Fifties, when it was rumoured that there was a pianist in Russia who caused even such formidable colleagues as Emil Gilels to exclaim in awe and amazement. Expectations were raised still higher when Julius Katchen, and later Lazar Berman, claimed that Richter was, quite simply, a nonpareil, a pianist whose titanic powers forbade even whispered comparisons. A single record appeared in 1958, improbably coupling concertos by Bach and Rachmaninov, and not even an appalling sound that turned horns into saxophones, or a sleeve note that baldly referred to the soloist as ST. Richter, could blunt the impact of such fluent and aristocratic playing. During the Sixties Richter at last appeared in the West. Packed houses in London and New York awaited his arrival with baited breath but, although Richter's greatness was beyond doubt, he was plainly and understandably a frightened man. Anticipation pulsed at fever pitch and the atmosphere at both the Royal Festival Hall and Carnegie Hall was fraught with tension. Perversely Richter began his three London recitals with a stunning Haydn and Prokofiev programme, only to become increasingly nebulous and withdrawn in Chopin and Debussy, Schubert and Schumann, lost and confused within his own oddly impenetrable reverie. The same happened in New York, where Richter's fascinating if very fallible readings were permanently captured on record by CBS. And what of Richter's Bach, Mozart and Beethoven, his Brahms and Liszt, Scriabin and Ravel? During the following years the answers came thick and fast but were often tantalising and rarely what anyone expected; sometimes baffling, sometimes frightening in their almost manic intensity and conviction. I doubt, for example, whether any of us ever felt quite the same after hearing Richter's Schubert. Together with his close friends and colleagues, Peter Pears and Benjamin Britten, Richter radically altered all possible preconceptions, extending every known parameter of interpretation and offering an idiosyncratic point of view that went wholly against the grain of received wisdom or Viennese convention. Tempos were often agonisingly slow - a Chinese water-torture, according to one critic; repeats were relentlessly observed; yet one sat hypnotised by Richter's trance-like state, by his tonal translucency, by the moonlit, mesmeric sheen he cast over pages that had once seemed almost cheerfully familiar. His tempos were scarcely less controversial in Beethoven. Conscious of the lack of a slow movement in the Sonata in E major, op. 14 no.1, Richter supplied his own, turning Beethoven's wistful Allegretto into a near-adagio of high tragedy. On the other hand, allegretto could easily become allegro, and allegro become presto, as in his stunning if coolly impersonal flight through the toccata-like finales of the Sonatas in A flat major, op.26, and F major, op.54. Richter's Schumann, on the other hand, was altogether less provocative and his readings of the Bunte Blatter, "Paganini" Etudes, Blumenstuck and Four Fugues, as well as the more familiar Toccata, Phantasie, Humoreske and Etudes symphoniques, were often of such classic status that they left other Schumann pianists in despair. How could one hope to offer anything of comparable stature or poetic calibre? 

(Debussy) 

Richter's appearances became increasingly sporadic over the years. Daunted by the energy required for massive tours or the strain imposed by appearing in the major concert halls, he increasingly confined himself to smaller, more intimate venues, notably at the Fetes Musicales in Tours and at the incomparably beautiful Teatro dell 'Accademia in Mantua, the theatre where Mozart played in 1770. There, in 1986, he offered no less than seven incomparable recitals, each devoted to a single composer. More audaciously, his London visit in 1989 included a programme of music by Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Bartok, Webern, Szymanowski and Hindemith, played with a blazing, propagandist zeal for some great but neglected corners of the repertoire. Personally, this particular recital (complete with interval champagne and a whimsical request for "carriages" at 11.00 pm) will always remain among my most dearly cherished musical memories. Preserved on record, it joins Richter's Philips Classics recordings of Schubert's great unfinished C major Sonata, Beethoven's "Diabelli" Variations, Franck's Piano Quintet and several of Liszt's most dark-hued and introspective utterances, together with his legendary 1958 Prague recital, to suggest, once more, Richter's unique and richly comprehensive powers. Idiosyncratic, plain-speaking, titanic, reserved, of a scarcely credible lyric virtuosity (I am thinking of him now in Liszt's Feux follets) and perhaps, above all, profoundly enigmatic, Richter remains one of the greatest recreative artists of all time.