Album review: Roger Woodward, In Concert: Debussy, Chopin, Bach (Celestial Harmonies)

Performed in the same Bremen Sendesaal in which Keith Jarrett's breakthrough Solo-Concerts: Bremen, Lausanne was recorded, Roger Woodward's In Concert profits from a wonderful room ambience playing to the strengths of the Bosendorfer piano, especially on the Debussy Preludes Book II, which opens the album. Played as one piece, with no gaps, it's an impressive feat of sonic shape-shifting, with no interruption to the flow of moods as Woodward progresses from the opening mystery of “Brouillards” to the dramatic conclusion of “Feux D'Artifice”. The enigmatic, courtly charm of three Chopin Mazurkas then leads to another towering delivery, of Bach's Partita No 6, an engrossing web of interlacing lines, featuring an extremely long “Sarabande”.

Download: Preludes Book II; Partita No 6