# To Scriabin fans: What is the best recording of Vers La Flamme Out There?



## silentio

I'm obsessed with this piece right now. Which one is your favorite?


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## DeepR

Horowitz is the most visceral, eruptive and electrifying. I also love the sound of that recording.
Some other pianists I've heard do bring more grace, subtlety and fluidity to the piece, which show different and interesting aspects of the piece. But when it comes down to it, I prefer the fire of Horowitz.

(Horowitz goes overboard in the live recording you can also find on youtube (with curtains in the background). Too spastic and too much mistakes in the end.)


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## chesapeake bay

Sofronitzky plays this well, albeit in a more subdued manner than Horowitz.


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## lextune

You should know the interpretations of all the great Scriabinists'; Sofronitsky, Horowitz, Richter, Ashkenazy, Zhukov. Each are great in their own way.

If I have to pick just one, today I would go with Zhukov...


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## silentio

Igor Zukhov never failed to impress me in Scriabin. I first heard him in the _5 Preludes Op.16_ and was instantly attracted. I then purchased his set of 10 sonatas. He played the youthful ones (1,2,3,4) passionately (yet with restraint and refinement) in a way I never heard before from Sofronitsky, Ashkenazy or Szidon.

I agree that Zhukov's is probably the best version of _Vers La Flamme_. It is easier to bang the piece than to play it. His tremolos were more strictly observed than in most of other pianists. That would give a more accurate depiction of a dancing, flickering flame.

Heinrich Neuhaus (the teacher of Richter, Gilels, and Zhukov) is also my favorite Scriabin intepreter.


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## Larkenfield

I'm a big fan of Scriabin and of _Vers La Flamme_. It's not just a match on fire, or a home, or the neighborhood, or the world, but Scriabin himself going up in flames in some fiery spiritual ascent and leaving ashes in his wake. I grew up with the Horowitz recording and I still think it's pretty hot, perhaps more percussive than most:


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## NLAdriaan

I have two Richter recordings (both of the same concert tour, 1992), one by Horowitz and one by Maria Lettberg. I can luckily say that I heard Richter playing it live (which was issued one of the two CD's). This thread was a good reason to compare them all.

It first occurs that each interpretation is very different. It has a free form as a musical poem, which leaves more room for interpretation.

From what I just heard, I would return both to Richter (the one on Philips 'authorised recordings', which was not the one I heard live) and Maria Lettberg. There is more fire in Richters but more poetry in Lettbergs playing. 

Horowitz' Scriabin CD (a CBS compilation) is for the most part wonderful, especially the Etudes, but his reading of 'Vers La Flamme' just didn't light me up.


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## flamencosketches

Couldn't possibly bear to pick, but my favorites are Horowitz, Richter, and Sofronitsky... probably in that order, if someone had a gun to my head, but it changes. This is one of the few Scriabin pieces where I feel that Sofronitsky doesn't totally dominate the competition... though of course his recording is great.


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## DeepR

Remember, don't listen too much! 

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong...mbered-parents-not-psychopath-hong-kong-court

Actually, bad joke. That's horrible. And it's also a pity that this great piece is associated with murder.


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## flamencosketches

DeepR said:


> Remember, don't listen too much!
> 
> https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong...mbered-parents-not-psychopath-hong-kong-court
> 
> Actually, bad joke. That's horrible. And it's also a pity that this great piece is associated with murder.


DAMN! What a headline :lol:

Definitely a terrible shame. But this kind of thing will happen. Like how the Catcher in the Rye is now inextricably linked with John Lennon's assassin.


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## Mandryka

Sokolov


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## millionrainbows

Scriabin seems to be using the diminished scale to travel chromatically through the harmonic terrain, sometimes disguising diminished formations as altered dominants. He latches on to a favorite chord of mine at the end, a maj7 #11. All the rest is just "elaboration."


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