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Voices of the Press
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Rubinstein World, Issue 1-2008
What was created here is an opalescent mixture of chamber musical intimacy and concert brilliancy, of concentration on musical soundness and virtuous joy of playing. This recording with Janina Fialkowska is one of the most successful contributions to this niche repertoire I ever encountered. Phrasing, touch culture and articulation are proof of the pianist’s Mozart experience.
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www.hifinews.co.uk
A lovely disc. … Her Mozart is more Kempff-like than projected as Rubinstein’s was, straightforward yet wonderfully musical. The booklet photograph suggests a fairly spare microphone setup (at Toronto’s Arts Centre) and the soundstage corresponds precisely, with the added string bass rounding out the textures. The lyrical C-major string quartet composed when Mozart was 17 is equally delightful.
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SA-CD.net, October 14, 07
My initial reaction was a big question mark. Why play these pieces in their arrangements for piano and string quintet. A rather pointless exercise, I thought.
I couldn’t be more wrong! This is surely the disc that I have had most pleasure from during the last six months, it is a delight from beginning to end. No wind instruments, chamber music instead. So of course the piano is a bit larger than before, but Fialkowska´s playing is so sensitive and intimate.
The whole enterprise is like a breath of fresh air. Two concertos with a youthful stamp played by musicians who obviously know and love the music intimately. I didn’t miss the wind instruments at all - on the contrary I think these works benefit from the chamber music treatment. But then I do love Mozart’s chamber music dearly.
Janina Fialkowska is a virtuoso player and her story is one of courage and endurance, read the notes. The rapport between her and the string players is a match made in heaven.
Add to this the reproduced sound by Atma. This is one of the best recordings I have ever heard. The sound coming from the string quintet is so lifelike it’s almost scary. And when the piano arrives I was even more aware of being in a small concert hall. This is Hi-Fidelity in big letters. Absolutely one of my records of the year, a pure delight!
Take note BIS, PentaTone and other companies. Take a good look at this SACD. When did you last see a CD as beautiful as this?! The cover design is so lovely and it suits the music perfectly. No Aquarium fish, no conductors looking mad. This is style and quality through and through.
Thomas Roth (Sweden)
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The Toronto Star, October 16, 07
In March, pianist Janina Fialkowska and her favourite chamber-music collaborators came to the Glenn Gould Studio to seduce us with two Mozart piano concertos that the composer had reduced to salon-size forces. This disc, recorded shortly afterward, captures the same magic of impeccable musicianship and transparent phrasing.
John Terauds
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BBC Music Magazine March 08
The pianist is prizewinner of the first ever Arthur Rubinstein Competition, Janina Fialkowska, who displays something of Rubinstein’s innate twinkling elegance in readings that highlight the chamber qualities of Mozart’s scores. She finds lambent soulfulness in the Andante of K414 – a concerto stamped with vintage A major Mozart – and the buoyant, incisive strings make it easier to achieve the light-on-its-toes perkiness of K 413’s minuet-flavoured Finale. Mozart’s woodwind can never lightly be excluded, so characteristic are they; but turn a blind ear: the Chamber Players of Canada certainly won’t disappoint you!
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CBC, Sound Advice, February 16th, 2008
Pianist JANINA FIALKOWSKA is her usual classy, elegant self. She’s articulate with clear ornaments and beautiful shaping. The piano sound is bright and full. All around - another winner for them. Five out of five.
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International Piano (Jan/Feb 2008)
Fialkowska maintains a luminescent, pearly legato tone at all dynamic levels, her cantabile phrasing creating the enchanting impression of musical droplets falling gently from the sky. Yet her fastidious attention to detail never draws attention to itself but rather serves as the perfect mechanism to facilitate readings that affectionately draw the listener in while maintaining Classical equilibrium at all times ... this comes highly recommended.
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Opus, February 2008
This recording out of Canada invites us to a musical gathering the likes of which we would like to hear more often. … splendid disc, in a recording that is remarkable for its natural and warmth … accompanied by the Chamber Players of Canada, the pianist Janina Fialkowska wins us over by her delicate touch and phrasing that is both poetic and luminous. Her playing is a palette of light rather than color, and perfectly illustrates what musicologist Theodore Baker said, which is that Mozart in fact is the "supreme musical genius whose works have remained unequalled as much because of their beauty, their lyricism and their rhythmic diversity as because of their melodic invention." A got-to-have. Jean-Jacques Millo (Translation Lawrence Schulman)
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