Rachmaninov: Preludes for Piano (Complete)

RACHMANINOFF Preludes (complete) • Eldar Nebolsin (pn) • NAXOS 8.570327 (77: 44) The technical and musical demands of the Rachmaninoff preludes are legion. A partial catalog might include: the ability to negotiate massive chords, sensitively voiced and often in quick succession; seamless arpeggios; perfect thirds, sixths, and other double-note figurations; a wide variety of attack and release strategies; the most delicate, leggierissimo fioratura; infinitely calibrated effects of crescendo, diminuendo, accelerando , and meno mosso ; intelligent rubato; and perhaps above all, the ability to launch and sustain a singing line. To these requirements might be added some suggestion of that special attribute (of which Rachmaninoff himself was the unexcelled exemplar) namely, the ability to suggest aural planes—a vivid foreground, mid-distance, and background—capable of revealing the most complex textures to the listener. Happily, this new recording reveals Eldar Nebolsin as