For a Bruckner aficionado, this disc of his miscellaneous piano music is a wonderful find. The chance to hear one of Bruckner's earliest secular works (the Lancier-Quadrille from around 1850), the opportunity to hear a massive sonata movement from just before he composed his first symphony (the Sonata from 1862), the occasion to hear an extended fantasy from just before his first published symphony, the Erinnerung from about 1868: these are things the dedicated Brucknerian will not what to miss. Of course, whether even the most dedicated Brucknerian will ever listen to this disc more than once is debatable because most of Bruckner's piano music is terrible. Bruckner's Quadrilles are annoying, his Sonata is pretentious, and his fantasy is puerile. And those are the interesting pieces. The rest is almost unbearable. But if a Bruckner aficionado has to hear a disc of Bruckner's piano music, this is the disc to hear. Pianist
Wolfgang Brunner does a wonderful job of breathing life into the music. It does help that
Brunner is playing a Bosendorfer built before 1835, thereby giving an air of gentility to the music. And it doesn't hurt that CPO has recorded
Brunner and his Bosendorfer in clean, quiet, and unobtrusively atmospheric sound. This is mandatory for the dedicated Bruckner aficionado, but don't expect the Symphony No. 9.