The Romantic Piano Concerto - 57

ADOLF WIKLUND (1879-1950): Piano Concertos No. 1 in E Minor, Op. 10 and No. 2 in B Minor, Op. 17, Konsertstycke in C, Op. 1.

Description: Wiklund's concertos were regularly performed in Sweden until the anti-music avant-garde of the 60s stomped them out. Heck, even Wilhelm Backhaus played the Second, to the greater glory of the Third Reich, in 1941 in Stockholm under Wiklund's baton. You couldn't want a more Nordic theme than the main one in the 1906-07 First's first movement; this is textbook Big Keyboard Romanticism and impossible not to love. No. 2 (1916-17) is more streamlined and a bit more buttoned-down but still of the same cut of cloth. You might think John Williams cribbed a theme from the 1902 Konsertsycke for the main title of a certain late 1970s space opera... By the way, if you have the 1988 Caprice CD of the two concertos, this one is not only faster and livelier, it restores cuts in the Second Concerto. Martin Sturfält (piano), Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra; Andrew Manze.