Classical Music in Poland and the Europe of Chopin - From the Reviewer's Notebook

A youthful Robert Schumann and Sergei Rachmaninoff The first precocious recording of the young Grigory Sokolov Grigory Sokolov Initially I was surprisingly disappointed by this recital but in the words of the great English poet William Wordsworth (1770-1850) from his Preface to the Lyrical Ballads of 1802 :     ‘Poetry takes its origin from emotions recollected in tranquility...' During this pause for thinking, my often tumultuous emotions when listening to Sokolov matured somewhat and I wrote the following appraisal of his programme.  With any great artist of this stature, one must never succumb to superficial assessments. This predisposition is all too common in our social media dominated world of trite generalizations, infantile cartoon figures and adoration of sensation at the expense of serious analytical thought - the all too common present retreat from the intellect.  Robert Schumann (1810-1856)       Kreisleriana   Op.16 Phantasien für das Pianoforte     Äusserst b