INTERNATIONAL PIANO:
Having already investigated the worlds of opera (dda25067) and the carnival (dda25076), Anthony Goldstone turns his attention to the ballet theatre with a scintillating recital of colourful miniatures.

Tchaikovsky benefits less from piano transcriptions than many other composers, simply because the staggering quality of his orchestration is such that the harmonic, textural and polyphonic clarity afforded by the piano is rendered virtually unnecessary. That said, to hear Goldstone affectionately shaping with effortless virtuosity his own skilful transcriptions of excerpts from The Nutcracker  and Swan Lake has one relishing these timeless phrases afresh. The glorious opening of the 'Black Swan' pas de deux exchanges the spectacular thrust of the orchestral original (Bonynge is inimitable here) for a salonesque intimacy of exquisite poise and timing. Indeed, what stands out here is Goldstone's ability to convert such pyrotechnically challenging showpieces as Weber's Invitation to the Dance  and Falla's Ritual Fire Dance  into mellifluous, velvet-toned classics, recalling an earlier age when pianists were appreciated more for their musical insights than the strength and independence of their fingers.

Typically, Goldstone includes a number of pianistic rarities along the way, including the enchanting pas de deux from Minkus's Don Quixote , the ballet music from Mozart's Ascanio in Alba  (what a remarkably fine Mozartian Goldstone is!) and the flitting 'Echo's Dance' from Elgar's The Sanguine Fan . Finest of all is Dohnányi's inimitable adaptation of the waltz from Delibes's Naïla , which Goldstone caresses with beguiling finesse and tonal subtlety.
Julian Haylock

AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE:
Each new release from Anthony Goldstone presents us with something special. Here we have ballet excerpts either rarely heard in this format or rarely heard at all. He opens with his own arrangement of the ‘Pas de deux' from the Nutcracker and takes us way beyond, through the final Coda. It works quite well, and the ear fills in the missing instruments.

From Swan Lake we hear the ‘black swan pas de deux' from Act 3 and a rarely heard 'Pas de deux' that only surfaced in the 1950's. Although left incomplete, it has been reconstructed, choreographed by Balanchine, and sometimes makes a ballet appearance as the “'Pas de deux of Seigfried and Odile'. The Swan Lake excerpts take a little over 20 minutes.

Goldstone has the added flexibility of performing pieces not originally written for ballet but adapted for ballet use by choreographers. Into this category fall Scott Joplin's ‘Elite Syncopations”, Chopin's waltz in C-sharp minor, and Weber's Invitation to the Dance – all stylishly performed.

Minkus, the composer of endless junk ballet, has Goldstone busy once again as an arranger, basing his keyboard reduction on Lanchberry's score for Don Quixote. The excerpts are pleasant if not much more. Dohnányi's virtuosic take on the Waltz from Delibes's Naïla is a most welcome inclusion, as is the brief excerpt from Elgar's Sanguine Fan.

If the ballet music from Mozart's Ascanio in Alba does not shake the heights, it is definitely a rarity, and Goldstone relishes each note. If one adds the pianist's literate writing and the fine piano sound, this becomes another feather in the cap of a true keyboard explorer.
Becker

MUSICWEB (2):
Before the advent of recording in the late nineteenth century, the piano transcription was amongst the most popular means to get orchestral music to the masses. While many composers rushed to get their own transcriptions out before the hacks beat them to the punch (and the money), there are also hundreds of fine examples of great composers transcribing the music of other greats. Liszt's dozens of transcriptions of the songs of Schumann and Schubert and the symphonies of Beethoven come immediately to mind.
 
Pianist Anthony Goldstone completes a trilogy of transcription collections with this group of excerpts from popular ballets. His other discs include A Night at the Opera, and The Piano at the Carnival. Mr. Goldstone proves himself a fine arranger as well. In an amply filled disc, Goldstone delivers up some remarkably clean and virtuosic playing. Of particular merit are the excellent renditions of excerpts from Tchaikovsky's three masterpieces, an exciting rendition of the Ritual Fire Dance of de Falla, and a thundery performance of Dohnányi's transcription of Delibes' Waltz from Naïla .
 
Mr. Goldstone's playing is full of nuance. It would be fairly easy in this music simply to play loud all the time. This trait is thankfully eschewed. There is a tendency however for many of these arrangements to lie overlong in the upper end of the keyboard, making for a little wear and tear on the ears after seventy-nine minutes. It is also fairly easy to separate the music of the masters such as Tchaikovsky and Falla from the fluff of Minkus. On the whole, however, this a satisfying program. Perhaps it is one that might be best sampled a couple of works at a time rather than listening to it from beginning to end. I confess that as well done as these transcriptions are, there is a sameness of style that gets a little old after an hour or so.
 
This is the first disc from the Divine Art label that I have had the pleasure of reviewing, and I found the production quality to be of the first order. Interesting and thorough program notes along with excellent sound quality make for an outstanding presentation.  
Kevin Sutton

MUSICWEB (1):
Anthony Goldstone has previously taken the piano to the opera and to the carnival for Divine Art. Once again he serves up a generous and very varied selection of music appropriate to his chosen title. The result is certainly entertaining although there were times when I felt that I was in a dance studio with a rehearsal pianist giving the dancers a reminder or foretaste of what the orchestra would sound like. This was especially the case with the four Pas de Deux that the pianist has arranged himself. Not that these are bad arrangements or that any dance studio would not be delighted to have a pianist of half this skill, but that there is surprisingly little attempt to transform the music into something wholly different, something apparently devised originally for the piano. In this these arrangements differ from, say, the Dohnányi or Falla, and even more so from the Chopin, Joplin and Weber which were originally written for the instrument. They are nonetheless made with great skill and understanding and never sound clumsy.
 
I did indeed enjoy the various Pas de Deux . Probably as it is the least musically interesting the Minkus was my particular favourite. As Anthony Goldstone says in his very full and interesting notes, this offers attractive melodies and foot-tapping rhythms. I always find something slightly comical about the male solo sections in the Pas de Deux with their exaggerated macho effects, and that from Don Quixote surely goes further over the top in that direction than most. The pause before the coda to the final section is another moment where one immediately imagines the dancers readying themselves for their final exhibition of virtuosity. Maybe these Pas de Deux did make me think of the rehearsal room but with great pleasure at the thought and even greater pleasure at the luxury of such a rehearsal pianist.
 
One odd man out in the programme is the Mozart. From the notes I learn that the bass lines of eight orchestral pieces survive in the composer's hand in a manuscript clearly linked with his early opera ( festa teatrale to be more exact) Ascanio in Alba . There is also a manuscript of a group of nine piano pieces the bass lines of two of which correspond with those in the orchestral pieces. From that it may be assumed that the piano pieces are an arrangement of the ballet. This sounds convincing in principle although the pieces themselves are frankly dull even if Anthony Goldstone does his best for them.
 
He has put the music in a cunning order with the Tchaikovsky and Minkus separated by the other works so that the listener never gets bored with a lengthy succession of music in the same style. This is essentially an enjoyable recital and if it does not set out to be profound it certainly does achieve its main object. It would be hard to be bored by it or finish listening to it other than in a cheerful mood.  
John Sheppard

MIDWEST RECORD joint review of 25067, 25073, 25076:
An initial impulse is to decry the foul economy and say that in a perfect world  this would have been a mighty box set.  On second thought, who needs that cleverness?  The only unifying factor on these three sets is that Goldstone proves he can play anything with such absolute mastery, subtly and style.  Taking his piano wizardry to familiar themes in the various genres he presents, each one is just such a joy that you could put them on your Ipod shuffle and not miss a beat as they play randomly.  A great talent at the top of his stride, there is simply nothing on any of these three sets that isn't enjoyable, probably by anyone.  This is great music to just sit back and let it wash over you.
Chris Spector

UK REGIONAL PRESS:
Goldstone's latest Divine Art recital finds him tackling a series of inventive arrangements for piano of works that are more closely associated with the world ob ballet. Some familiar musical themes are given an airing in the process, including Manuel de Fall's “Ritual Fire Dance” and extracts from Tchaikovsky's “The Nutcracker” and “Swan Lake.” Sparkling instrumental fare from one of Britain's most respected classical pianists.
Kevin Bryan

WRIGHTMUSIC:
We are glad that Anthony Goldstone has broken away from the confines and predictability of Schubert and has made some very important discs of Russian music by Rebikov, who Scriabin later aped and received an acknowledgement that was due to Rebikov, and discs of fine piano works by Glière and Lyapunov.

Anthony Goldstone is a very good pianist and a most congenial man. Some of the music on this disc is his own arrangements such as the Minkus and Tchaikovsky and the arrangements are very well conceived for the piano.

I must confess that I am not a lover of transcriptions. Take, for example, the ballet music of Tchaikovsky. Some of it is exquisite such as the wordless chorus in the Nutcracker soaring above some of the most sumptuous orchestration you will ever hear. Whatever may be said of Tchaikovsky he was a magnificent orchestrator and I would always want to hear his orchestral music in that form. The Beethoven symphonies and the Liszt symphonic poems are vastly superior in their orchestral forms and I want to hear them in that form not confined to the piano.

Nonetheless, Goldstone revels in these transcriptions and his playing can only be admired. He has a wonderful ability to get to the heart of the music. He is a communicator of the highest order. We should have him more in concertos and recall his sensitive Beethoven Four.

But there is a justifiable moan. *** The first four tracks are called Pas de deux from the Nutcracker, but the Pas de deux is the track one, track three, for example, is the Sugar Plum Fairy. The four pieces should have been called a Suite since there are not four separate pas de deux. The same complaint can be made about the Minkus selection and the Swan Lake selection. It is both confusing and annoying. This really is bad on titling and planning. *** (see note below)

The music varies in quality but that is not Goldstone's fault of course. The Elgar is not even worth its two minutes but the Chopin stands on its own although it is subject to some awful performances on discs.

One very interesting feature [is] that this disc has brought to clearer light Mozart's influence of Tchaikovsky. No wonder the Russian wrote a suite called Mozartiana and I may never have reached this clear consideration had I not heard this disc.

It is a very pleasurable CD, deserves to find friends, shows us how gifted and dedicated a pianist Goldstone is and we admire and praise him for music off the beaten track. More rare Russian piano music please, Mr. Goldstone.

The sound quality is very good. The picture of the cover is delightful.
David Wright

*** Dr Wright has cited sources in support of this view of what constitutes a pas de deux - however, au contraire, the reader might refer to these sources:

"The opening Adage of the 'Nutcracker'], which sweeps all before it in its descending melodic outline, surely conjures up the true spirit of the Russian imperial ballet in all its glory – indeed it is so commanding that this movement alone is often wrongly taken to be the entire pas de deux." Geoffrey Walters, ex ballet dancer, quoted in the CD booklet notes.

Encyclopedia Britannica: "dance for two performers. The strictly classical balletic pas de deux followed a fixed pattern: a supported adagio, a solo variation for the male dancer , a solo variation for the female dancer, and a coda in which both participants displayed their virtuosity. "

www.thefreedictionary.com defines a pas de deux as "A dance for two, especially a dance in ballet consisting of an entrée and adagio, a variation for each dancer, and a coda."

Wikipedia says: "In  ballet, a pas de deux is a duet in which ballet dancers perform the dance together. It usually consists of an  entrée,  adagio, two variations  (one for each dancer), and a coda."