Regarding Tim Mahon's comments about the "the stunning quality of the notes"
on the McCallum CD, I would like to mention an even more extraordinary
example of liner notes that accompany BMG's High Performance CD of Raymond
Lewenthal playing the piano music of Alkan and Liszt, BMG 09026-63310-2.

EVERY word from the original Alkan LP is there, including the 12" square
insert, which is filled with Lewenthalisms.  I don't have the original
Liszt disk, but I suspect that the same thoroughness holds true for it too.
The musical examples have not been included, however.  It is a little
strange to read Lewenthal's words from 1965 in 1999.  When he states "that
Alkan's day is at long last dawning.", it takes a minute to realize that
this statement was made over thirty years ago.  Maybe it is now really
true.

Along the same thread, the new Elan double CD called "Raymond Lewenthal,
The Concerto Recordings" is another matter entirely.  The title is
misleading since fully a fourth of the music is solo piano music of Alkan.
I'm NOT complaining!!  It's great to finally have these pieces available
again, but MUCH more could have been done with the liner notes.  The insert
is limited to 4 CD-sized panels.  One is taken up with the front cover and
the back is a view of 2 other Elan disks.  The cover art is a full-length
photo of Lewenthal taken from one of the original records and the CD's
themselves are printed with picture.  A bit of irony that only those who
have the original records can readily appreciate.

The other half of the notes consists of a list of the music (one panel)
and some biographical information on Lewenthal.  There is NO mention of
the music.  This is clearly a disk devoted to Lewenthal, and if you want
to know about the music, you will have to look elsewhere.  There are
also several typos, and the titles of some of the Alkan pieces are not
translated correctly as they were on the original LP notes which I have.
I understand that Elan wanted an amplified insert, but was not able to
arrange it because of their licensing agreement.

Joel Hill
Tallahassee, FL - USA
ALKAN Web Page: http://www.nettally.com/joelhill/alkan