Mendelssohn: Lieder ohne Worte; Alkan: 25 Préludes, Op.31 No. 8
Igor Levit (piano)
Sony Classical 19658878982 43:20 mins
This recording, which exists only in digital form, was produced at very short notice in early December, with Igor Levit and his team committing to donate all of the profits to two German organisations: OFEK Advice Centre for Anti-Semitic Violence and Discrimination, and the Kreuzberg Initiative Against Anti-Semitism.
‘I made this recording out of a very, very strong inner necessity,’ Levit explains. ‘I spent the first four or five weeks after the attack on 7 October in a mixture of speechlessness and total paralysis. And it became clear that I had no other tools than to react as an artist.’ Hence his decision to record this selection of Mendelssohn’s Lieder ohne Worte, and to donate the proceeds to organisations dedicated to helping young people in Berlin avoid anti-Semitic persecution.
This isn’t the first time Levit has been overt in his response to politics. The day after Russia invaded Ukraine, he deleted his Twitter account and instructed his agent to announce that he would ‘only react with music to political events’. Two days later he posted a video of himself dedicating a concert in Brussels to the Ukrainian people, and playing the country’s national anthem – and then reactivated his Twitter account.
There’s an early recording of Horowitz extracting lovely poetry from some of Mendelssohn’s tender little pieces. Designed for children and amateurs, their charms are generally underrated by professionals – but Levit finds beauty in them, expressed with a warm touch and pleasing emotional directness.
He doesn’t explain why he’s concluded this miniature recital with a prelude by Charles-Valentin Alkan, but it doesn’t feel inappropriate, with a plaintive melody over a sinister bass rumble which approaches threateningly, then marches off into the distance.