New Classics: Annie Fischer: The Centennial Collection
Hungarian pianist Annie Fischer (1914–1995) was born in Budapest and studied at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music there with Ernő Dohnányi. In 1933 she won the International Franz Liszt Piano Competition in her native city and in the many decades that followed she enjoyed a prolific career, playing mainly in Europe and Australia. Her amazing talent for music was accompanied by a sound foundation in the art, exceptional skills, precision and an outstanding intelligence as a performer. Her interpretations of Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert and Schumann, as well as Hungarian composers like Béla Bartók continue to receive the highest praise from pianists and critics. Despite her superior technical skills, she never indulged in virtuosity for just virtuosity’s sake: she complemented her brilliant technique with varied key-pressing and a refined, sophisticated sound. The honesty, artless simplicity, purity and deep musicality of Annie Fischer’s piano performances can still be enjoyed today through her many studio recordings. This beautifully presented 3-CD box set features music by Beethoven (Piano Concerto No. 3), Liszt, Schubert and four works by Mozart, including his Piano Concertos Nos 20 and 21, with the Budapest Symphony Orchestra conducted by Ervin Lukács. Fischer’s intense yet seemingly effortless playing was greatly admired by contemporaries such as Otto Klemperer and Sviatoslav Richter, who wrote that ‘Annie Fischer is a great artist imbued with a spirit of greatness and genuine profundity.’
Source: New Classics