HAROLD SHAPERO (1920-2013): Piano Sonata in F Minor, Variations in C Minor, Four-Hand Sonata.

Description: Shapero bucked the trend of modernism, sticking to classical form and writing tonal music in a neo-classical style with plenty of well-crafted contrapuntalism, especially in these early works from 1948, 1947 and 1941 (respectively as listed above). One of the most remarkable things is his long-breathed, gentle and expressive slow music - the 15-minute arioso of the 37-minute sonata and almost the entire 22 minutes of the Variations are like a warm embrace. The Four-Hand Sonata is more spiky and Stravinskian as befits a work written for performance by himself and his college duo-partner Leonard Bernstein (whose adventures as duo pianists as told in the notes are worth half the price of the disc alone). Sally Pinkas (piano), Evan Hirsch (secondo).