#227 The Smell of Evening Beach

The rush is gone. It's just lovers, and sunset, and small waves, and wind, cold a little bit. The life is pulsing, irregularly. And when the melody in the ninth minute unwinds, it's all coming into blossom.

Steinbacher and Kulek can bring pretty casual sound, it's like an improvisation, random ideas, here and now.

Composer: Johannes Brahms
Work: Sonata for piano and violin No 1, I. Vivace ma non troppo
Recording: Arabella Steinbacher, Robert Kulek

#225 The Smell of Imperative

What a change of mood at 0'28''! We're getting into something so serious, big, and imperative. The smell is drying up but it's still there, in these tiny piano lines, till the end.

Ott is perfect in this concerto, very lisztian, precise, musically brilliant and technically marvelous.

Composer: Franz Liszt
Work: Piano Concerto No 1, III. Allegro marziale animato
Recording: Alice Sara Ott, Münchner Philharmoniker, Thomas Hengelbrock

#213 The Smell of Suffering

The beginning, that's real pain. I wonder if somewhere else a composer was so successful in translating his suffering to music. However, there's also a fight, a majestic sound keeping us up, filling us with hope.

Buchbinder and Harnoncourt in what might be the best recording of this concerto ever (yet not your typical Brahms). Highly spirited, infiltrating and completing each other.

Composer: Johannes Brahms
Work: Piano Concerto No 1, I. Maestoso
Recording: Rudolf Buchbinder, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Nikolaus Harnoncourt

#208 The Smell of Nerves

The first calling, that's a fanfare before a crippled waltz, before a ball of monsters. A ball taking place in a head of somebody exhausted, enervate.

Volodos jumps from creepy playing to high-toned dignity, changes tempi. He's luring us away from the sane world.

Composer: Sergei Rachmaninov
Work: Morceaux de fantaisie No 5, Serenade
Recording: Arcadi Volodos

#207 The Smell of Tense

This song never ends but it's not a stream, it's not a spinning wheel. It's more elastic, tense, and strung. The smell is somehow honey-sweet and honey-fluid.

Hampson keeps the tense constantly, his voice is vehement and insistent.

Composer: Robert Schumann
Work: Diechterliebe, "Aus meinen Tränen sprießen"
Recording: Thomas Hampson, Geoffrey Parsons

#206 The Smell of Disease

A very peaceful motif starts to spread like cancer. The dark tones at 1'49'' are so ill and omnious. Decorum of the beginning is returning: for the last times, with these dark tones, in an unlikely symbiosis.

Kovacevich is soft and thoughtful. Not so sparkling, not ornamental, not playful.

Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven
Work: Piano Sonata No 22, I. In tempo di menuetto
Recording: Stephen Kovacevich

#204 The Smell of Eagerness

The waves are rolling, the flow is rushing, and it's all very impatient and eager. I want this and this and all! The low tones at 0'54'' are crying: mine, mine, mine! The central part is very strong, calmly strong, unshakable. After that, sharpness dims. Eagerness, however, nervously stays.

Buchbinder has a special way how to send tones to a listener. It's so natural and elegant at once. Very impressive.

Composer: Frédéric Chopin
Work: Impromptu No 4
Recording: Rudolf Buchbinder

#199 The Smell of Flush

Smell the hesitation and passion in the first tone–how it does not know where to go, whether to continue. It's a young love at its best: to love and to be loved in return with all the flushes and intoxications.

Čechová had to be in love when she played it. You get the sense of a week body being dragged back and forth by unknown forces. It's so dedicated, so painful, so beautiful.

Composer: Bedřich Smetana
Work: Louisen Polka
Recording: Jitka Čechová

#153 The Smell of Stairway

This composition runs on and up, it's a stairway, sometimes massive, sometimes steep but still grand. You have to run the stairs–there are spots where you can breathe out but in these moments, hunting memories are coming to your head: go, go!

Argerich on her debut recital album is marvelous. She unstoppable, raved. But don't think about it as about a romantic aberrance–this is well structured, totally controlled performance. Very Brahms, very Argerich.

Composer: Johannes Brahms
Work: Rhapsody No 1
Recording: Martha Argerich

#145 The Smell of Honey

This piece is somehow sweet and dangerous. Its viscosity, its smoothness with little crystals, is so charming. The final disappearance is like the last drop of honey that almost drops and then backs off to the spoon.

Kremer and Maisenberg deliver a focused, sharp performance with wonderful dynamic levels.

Composer: Franz Schubert
Work: Rondo Brillant D895, I. Andante
Recording: Gidon Kremer, Oleg Maisenberg

#143 The Smell of Damping

Not the moon on the cloudy sky but a damping haze is here. Low-key melancholy of tones, still the same, a mood caught in a split of second and expanded to four minutes. No tears, just catatonia.

This is not a typical Moonlight sonata, and maybe it's a recording you would not like. Gould goes for faster tempo and left hand emphasis. He deliberately keeps the magic down–no place for romantism.

Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven
Work: Piano Sonata No 14, I. Adagio sostenuto
Recording: Glenn Gloud

#137 The Smell of Snowflake

Coming from monotone heavy sky, just one and only, a snowflake. Dancing in wind, going up and down, waiting for a sun beam to shine on it–to be sparkling, to be beautiful. And then, second, third... the air is full of them and they're all the same and they're all uninteresting.

Matsuev makes the lovely music sing. Soft, romantic touch... one can get intoxicated very easily.

Composer: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Work: The Seasons, V. May - White Nights
Recording: Denis Matsuev

#135 The Smell of Chandelier

It's an old one. Big, crystal, dusty. Vanished elegance–still there, waiting. Maybe gaspy, willing to join the party that's over for centuries.

Kovacevich's tone is elegant and sad. No parody here–respect and piety.

Composer: Frédérick Chopin
Work: Waltz No 1
Recording: Stephen Kovacevich

#130 The Smell of Melancholy

What a magical beginning! Soft piano and microscopic violin sounds, trying to grow, to be bigger. But there's no joy in being bigger. In full blossom, the mood is pushing again and again the same melancholy button.

Argerich and Kremer are masters. You can hardly believe it's just music. There has to be more: true magic.

Composer: Robert Schumann
Work: Violin Sonata No 2, III. Leise, einfach
Recording: Martha Argerich, Gidon Kremer

#128 The Smell of Diamond

A very gentle melody, fragile and innocent. But the piano keys are hurting, the strokes are sharp. Many angles, different lights.

What Gieseking is achieving here is marvelous. He is the music he's playing, he himself is a gentle diamond.

Composer: Claude Debussy
Work: Préludes, VIII. ...La fille aux cheveux de lin
Recording: Walter Gieseking

#117 The Smell of Figure Skating

One leg, the other. Slow, elegant movements. Turn around, skate backward. Jump! Another! And two more! This piece of music is so instructional, you can rewrite every bar to skating terminology: spin here, toe jump there, speed up, extend arms.

Lewis is kind of strict, lathe-like. Merely dancing, more constructing. Maybe geometry is the word.

Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven
Work: Piano Sonata No 10, III. Scherzo: Allegro assai
Recording: Paul Lewis

#116 The Smell of Tempest

Tempest itself, that would be too simple. Here's the full game plan, board finely being built for the match. Even the peaceful intermezzo is well structured, some higher plans on mind. And then–the rage: everything works, all figures move at once. Attack, attack! The air is clear.

Martinů wrote this piece for Firkušný, what better recommendation would you get? He is a master of the keyboard.

Composer: Bohuslav Martinů
Work: Fantasy and Toccata, II. Toccata
Recording: Rudolf Firkušný

#115 The Smell of Falling

It starts in very airy mood, like a dragonfly above a lake. But the main theme exposes our mistake: It's not a flight, it's a free fall. Yes, there's wind dragging us away but inevitably we're still falling down.

Helfgott is trying to hide here. I don't know what he's trying to say, it's too organic, too compact. There are some inclinations to happiness, to flying. Stop analyzing it–Helfgott is preluding, after all.

Composer: Sergei Rachmaninov
Work: Prelude No 12, Op. 32
Recording: David Helfgott

#111 The Smell of Romantic Love

The two voices, piano and violin, are so bedazzled here, so in love. They are walking together, holding hands, complementing sentences. Opiate infatuation of the first weeks.

The sound is soft and rounded. No thorns, even the rise at 5'14'' is so amorous. At the end, the music tells us: go, leave the lovers alone.

Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven
Work: Violin Sonata No 5, II. Adagio molto espressivo
Recording: Oleg Kagaan, Sviatoslav Richter

#110 The Smell of Cutting

I smell meat and a sharp knife. With every note, there comes a cut: a short one, a robust one, a shallow one,  a bold one. In higher tones, it's more piercing. The whole cycle is only seven minutes long.

I smell Vermont-like melancholy. Is the end of winter really spring? Or is there something in-between, something like void and knife? Frazin's music does not give answers (actually there is an inkling of peace at 0'34''). All attempts (like the one at 1'08'') end in hollowness again and again.

Composer: Howard Frazin
Work: Music For The End Of Winter, 5. Music For The End Of Winter
Recording: Kate Boyd