02.09.2016

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Nargiz Aliyarova Plays Frederic Chopin
Nargiz Aliyarova (piano)
Etcetera KTC 1508

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Tough task of a Chopin programme fails

Nargiz Aliyarova is a sensitive pianist with musicality and good ideas, but these do not suffice to do justice to a typical Chopin programme. The CD opens with four waltzes. Her delicacy and light touch are there to admire, but the changes in tempo are not managed well and the waltzes sound hackneyed. The following Berceuse is definitely below standard with an unsustained legato fail, the piece is almost dissected into fragments and would better have been left out of the CD. A random selection of seven mazurkas follow but all being in the minor key and none having the mazurka flavour and style in a rhythmic sense, the mazurkas give a feeling of a random and lacklustre approach. Aliyarova’s preference to go for the minor keys continues with the five nocturnes that conclude the CD. She has opted to go for the least sophisticated and relatively more straightforward nocturnes where her basic musicality is her leading virtue, plus there is an intimacy that nocturnes benefit from but that is about it and in a discography with an abundance of nocturnes, this CD offers nothing to remember.

Feyzi Erçin