John Smyth writes:

>I'm looking for the complete Scriabin Etudes and have seen a Naxos
>recording and a Hyperion recording.  The Naxos features Idil Beret and
>the later features Piers Lane. Any suggestions?

The Lane etudes are very good.  But indispensable to any collection
are Vladimir Sofronitky's incomparable recordings.  Mind you, he did not
record all of the etudes, but quite a few of them.  His readings, prismatic
and intense, go a long way to illuminating the underlying turbulence and,
particularly in the later ones, the prescient ambiguities that would
eventually inform his idiosyncratic harmonic language.  Nikita Magaloff's
set evoke something of the old world, of the pleasures of their peculiar
texts...they are, how shall we say, fin de siecle (the last siecle!)
Russian, their edges soft, their rhtyhms pliant, their colors subfusc and
pastel, like those salmon and turquoise palaces you see along the Nevsky
Prospekt on a sultry summer day.  Arthur Greene makes a strong showing,
though be warned: though passionate and intelligently adjudicated, he
plays everything so damn loudly that you'll feel as if you're sitting
under an incoming jet at Kennedy Airport.  Don't bother with Laredo, whose
scriabin playing is the worst ever committed to record.  There are several
good Russian versions, including Viktor Merzhanov's complete set on
Melodiya, Alexander Paley (also on Naxos) brings an appealing buoyancy to
them, and Chitose Okashiro's readings (Pro Piano) are likewise attractive
and lyrical, highly idiosyncratic and beautifully played, though not in
the least idiomatic where the unique traditions that govern Scriabin
interpretation are concerned.  Nor should one ignore Richter's phenomonal
contributions here - though reretably, he never recorded them all.
Horowitz, too, is no slouch, and his recording of Op 65 is riveting.
Finally, you might want to hear Scriabin himself playing several of them
(Welte Mignon piano rolls) now available on CD from Harmonia Mundi.

John Bell Young