Martha Argerich in Buenos Aires
Updated: Sep 27
I am always interested in pianists in South America (see my Jorge Bolet links here [1936-58] and here [1974-84], and in general, for concert agents and travel, here).
Thus, I am indebted to Christian Johansson for the following information on Martha Argerich's recordings.
1949: Auditorium Radio El Mundo, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Beethoven: Piano Concerto No.1 in C major, Op.15
Alberto Castellanos(?) / Gran Orquesta Clásica de LR1 (Radio Nacional)
This is the earliest known recording with Argerich, who would have been ca. 8 years old here.
1950: Auditorium Radio El Mundo, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Mozart: Piano Concerto No.20 in D minor, K.466
– Alberto Castellanos / Gran Orquesta Clásica de LR1 (Radio Nacional)
Cadenzas: B. Sekles
November 26, 1952: Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Schumann: Piano Concerto in A minor, Op.54
– Washington Castro / Orquestra Sinfonica de la Ciudat de Buenos Aires
Encores:
Bach: Toccata in G major, BWV 916
Mendelssohn: Caprice in A minor, Op.33 No.1
1955: Buenos Aires, Argentina (Home Recording)
Chopin: Etude in C major, Op.10 No.1
Also on Doremi DHR 8036.
1955
? Buenos Aires
Beethoven Piano Sonata No.21 in C major, Op.53 "Waldstein" - 1st movement Allegro Chopin 12 Etudes, Op.10 No.1 in C major, Op.10-1 (as above)
J. S. Bach Toccata in C minor BWV.91
W. A. Mozart Piano Sonata No.18 in D major, K.576 - 1st movement Allegro
July 19, 1965: Teatro Opera, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Schumann: Toccata in C major, Op.7
Schumann: Fantasy in C major, Op.17
Prokofiev: Piano Sonata No.3 in A minor, Op.28
Chopin: Barcarolle in F-sharp major, Op.60
Chopin: Piano Sonata No.3 in B minor, Op.58
*A piano apparently string breaking in the middle of the 2nd movement of the Schumann Fantasy. and for those who like such thins, the famous locus classicus of the wrong note, the coda to the March is at c.27:29.
July 6, 1969: Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires, Argentina (Audiostream128 | Mp3DDL)
Bach: English Suite No.2 in A minor, BWV 807
Schumann: Piano Sonata No.2 in G minor, Op.22
Liszt: Funérailles, S.173 No.7 (from Harmonies Poétiques et Religieuses)
Ravel: Jeux d’eau
Chopin: Ballade No.3 in A-flat major, Op.47
Chopin: Mazurka in C major, Op.24 No.2
Chopin: Mazurka in F minor, Op.63 No.2
Chopin: Scherzo No.2 in B-flat minor, Op.31
Encores:
Schumann: Von fremden Ländern und Menschen, Op.15 No.1 (from Kinderszenen)
Prokofiev: Piano Sonata No.7 in B-flat major, Op.83 – III
July 28, 1969: Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires, Argentina (Radio Broadcast | FLAC)
Grieg: Piano Concerto in A minor, Op.16
– Pedro Ignacio Calderón / Buenos Aires Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra
July 27. 1986
Buenos Aires
Beethoven Piano Concerto No.2 in B-flat major, Op.19 (Blech/Orquesta Sinfónica)
Liszt Piano Concerto No.1 in E-flat major (Blech/Orquesta Sinfónica)
Prokofiev Piano Concerto No.3 in C major, Op.26 (Blech/Orquesta Sinfónica)
Schumann Kinderszenen, Op.15 - Von fremden Ländern und Menschen
September 25, 1999
Buenos Aires
Prokofiev Symphony No.1 in D major, Op.25 "Classical Symphony" （
Transcription for 2 Pianos by Rikuya Terashima） （Piano 2: Freire）
Rachmaninov Symphonic Dances, Op.45 （for two pianos） （Piano 1: Freire）
Lutosławski Variation on a Theme by Paganini for 2 pianos （Piano 2: Freire）
Schubert Rondo in A major, Op.107 D.951 for four hands （Piano 1: Freire）
Ravel Ma Mère l'Oye （for 4 hands） （Piano 2: Freire）
Ravel Ma Mère l'Oye （for 4 hands） - 3. Laideronnette, Impératrice des Pagodes. Mouvement de Marche （Piano 2: Freire）
Rachmaninov Suite No.2, Op.17 - Valse, Tarantella （Piano 2: Freire）
September 28, 1999
Buenos Aires
Chopin Piano Concerto No.1 in E minor, Op.11 （Calderón/Buenos Aires Philharmonic）
D. Scarlatti Sonata in D minor, K.141=L.422
Chopin Mazurka in F minor, Op.63-2
September 29, 1999
Buenos Aires
Beethoven Sonata for Piano and Violoncello No.5 in D major, Op.102-2 （Maisky)
Debussy Sonata in G major, for Violoncello and Piano （Maisky)
Schumann Fantasiestrücke for Cello and Piano, Op.73 （Maisky)
Shostakovich Sonata for Violoncello and Piano in D minor, Op.40 （Maisky)
Chopin Sonata for Piano and Violoncello in G minor, Op.65 - Largo （Maisky)
Chopin Introduction et polonaise brillante, Op.3 （Maisky)
Schumann Märchenbilder for Cello and Piano, Op.113 (transcr. Misha Maisky) - 1. Nichtschnell （Maisky)
November 10, 2001 （Buenos Aires/live） BC BP
Kreisler Liebesleid (Hosszu-Legocky)
・November 10 （Buenos Aires/live） BC BP
Ravel Piano Concerto in G major (Tibricá /Orquesta Estabile del Teatro Colón)
Ravel Piano Concerto in G major - Presto
・November 19 （Rosario, Agrgentina/live）
Guastavino Las Niñas (Piano 1: Delgado) flv
・November （Buenos Aires/live）
Bartók Romanian Folk Dances (Violin: Geza Hosszu-Legocky) mp4
Guastavino "Bailecito" (Piano 1: Delgado) flv
November 21, 2002 （Buenos Aires/live） Web
Ravel La Valse - excerpt (Piano 2: Tiempo)
September 6, 2003 （Buenos Aires/live）
Rachmaninov Suite No.1 "Fantasie-tableaux", Op.5 - 1.Barcarolle: Allegretto Piano 1: Darío Ntaca flv
September 8 （Buenos Aires/live）
Mercedes Sosa and Martha Argerich, Concierto de Cámara flv*5
・October （Buenos Aires/live） (á)
Beethoven Piano Concerto No.2 in B-flat major, Op.19 (Dario Ntaca/Sinfonietta Argerich)
・October 7, 2004 （Buenos Aires/live）
Beethoven Piano Concerto No.3 in C minor, Op.37 （Ligia Amadio/Buenos Aires Philharmonic Orchestra) FLV*2 mp3 m4a
October 25, 2012 (Rosario, Argentina/live)
Schubert Fantasy in F minor, Op.103 (D.940) for Piano, 4 hands (Piano 1: Delgado) FLV
Ravel Ma Mère l'Oye （for 4 hands） (Piano 2: Delgado) mp.4
・August 3, 2014 (Buenos Aires/live)
Beethoven Piano Concerto No.1 in C major, Op.15 （Barenboim/West-Eastern Divan Orchestra）
August 2014
Filmed live at Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires, August 2014
Martha Argerich and Daniel Barenboim united for their first-ever joint public performances in the city of their birth.
WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART
Sonata for Two Pianos in D minor K448
FRANZ SCHUBERT
Variations on an Original Theme in A flat major D 813 for Piano Four Hands
IGOR STRAVINSKY
Le sacre du printemps (Version for Piano Duet)
I. The Adoration of Harth
II. The Sacrifice
ROBERT SCHUMANN
0Andante and Variations for Two Pianos, Op.46 °
SERGEI RACHMANINOV
from Suite No.2, Op.17:
Waltz
CARLOS GUSTAVINO
Bailecito
DARIUS MILHAUD
from Scaramouche, Op.165b:
Brazileira (mouvement de samba)
MARTHA ARGERICH, piano
DANIEL BARENBOIM, piano
*Linor Katz & Kian Soltani, cello - Jorge Monte de Fez, horn
Filmed live at Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires, August 2014
July 26, 2015 (Buenos Aires/live)
Debussy 6 Pieces in Canonic Form for two Pianos (original: Schumann) （Piano 1: Barenboim） Pearl Music/mp4 DG Japan G
Debussy En blanc et noir (for two pianos) （Piano 1: Barenboim） Pearl Music/mp4 DG Japan G
Bartók Sonata for 2 pianos and percussion （Piano 1: Barenboim Perc.: ?） Pearl Music/mp4 DG Japan G
July 29, 2017
(plaza vaticano, Buenos Aires/live)
W. A. Mozart Sonata in D major, K.381 (123a) for Piano for 4 hands Piano 1: Baremboim mp.4
Wagner (arr. by Debussy) Der Fliegende Holländer - Overture Piano 2: Baremboim mp.4
Tchaikovsky (arr. by Debussy) Swan Lake Suite - Spanish Dance Piano 2: Baremboim mp.4
Guastavino "Bailecito" Piano 2: Baremboim mp.4
Tchaikovsky (arr. by Debussy) Swan Lake Suite - Neapolitan Dance Piano 2: Baremboim mp.4
・August (Buenos Aires/live)
Shostakovich Concerto for Piano and String Orchestra Op.35 (Barenboim/West-Eastern Divan Orchestra) wav mp.4
Ravel Ma Mère l'Oye （for 4 hands） - 3. Laideronnette Piano 2: Baremboim mp.4
July 27, 2019 (Buenos Aires/live)
Schumann Piano Concerto in A minor, Op.54 (Mehta/Israel Phil.) mp.4
Schumann Kinderszenen, Op.15 - 1. Von fremden Ländern und Menschen mp.4
2020 (Centro Cultural Kirchner, Buenos Aires): Performed an acclaimed all-Bach program, featuring the Partita in C minor (BWV 826) and the Sonata for violin and piano in C minor (BWV 1017) alongside violinist Rafael Gíntoli.
August 12, 2022 (Buenos Aires/live) mp.4
Ravel Piano Concerto in G major (Dutoit/Buenos Aires Philharmonic)
Ravel Ma Mère l'Oye （for 4 hands） - 3. Laideronnette, Impératrice des Pagodes. Mouvement de Marche (Piano 2: David Chen)
・August 20 (Buenos Aires/live) mp.4
Prokofiev Piano Concerto No.3 in C major, Op.26 (Gorelik/Buenos Aires Philharmonic）
Schumann Kinderszenen, Op.15 - 1. Von fremden Ländern und Menschen
・August 22 (Buenos Aires/live) mp.4
Saint-Saëns Le Carnaval des Animaux (Lim, Aniie, Dutoit/Buenos Aires Philharmonic)
Saint-Saëns Le Carnaval des Animaux - Finale (Lim, Aniie, Dutoit/Buenos Aires Philharmonic)
July 15, 2023 (Buenos Aires/live) mp.4
Schumann Piano Quintet in E-flat major, Op.44 (Montero, Glava, Huespe, Todorov) mp.4
Schumann Piano Quintet in E-flat major, Op.44 (Montero, Glava, Huespe, Todorov) - 3rd movement mp.4
15.07.2023 Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires
Schumann: Piano quintet in E flat, op. 44
Martha Argerich (piano); Freddy Varela Montero (violin); Tatiana Glava (violin); Fernando Rojas Huespe (viola); Stanimir Todorov (cello)
・July 19 (Buenos Aires/live) mp.4
Debussy En blanc et noir (for two pianos) (Piano 2: Goerner)
W. A. Mozart Sonata in D major, K.448 (375a) for Two Pianos (Piano 1: Goerner)
Rachmaninov Symphonic Dances, Op.45 （for two pianos） (Piano 1: Goerner)
Milhaud Scaramouche - Brasileira (Piano 1: Goerner)
Guastavino "Bailecito" (Piano 1: Goerner)
・July 22 (Buenos Aires/live) mp.4
Shostakovich Concerto for Piano and String Orchestra Op.35 (Nakariakov, Gasançon/Orquesta Filarmónica de Buenos Aires)
Shostakovich Concerto for Piano and String Orchestra Op.35 - 4th movement (Nakariakov, Gasançon/Orquesta Filarmónica de Buenos Aires)
Schumann/Nakariakov Fantasiestrücke for Flugelhorn and Piano, Op.73 (Nakariakov)
・July 30 (Buenos Aires/live) mp.4
Stravinsky Les Noces - Scènes chorégraphiques russes (Dutoit/Orquesta Filarmónica de Buenos Aires et. al)
Beethoven Choral Fantasy in C minor Op.80 (Dutoit/Orquesta Filarmónica de Buenos Aires et. al)
Schumann Kinderszenen, Op.15 - 1. Von fremden Ländern und Menschen
Berliner Morgenpost, 22 May 2016
[Daniel Barenboim was 7 and Martha Argerich was 8, they regularly attended Friday night chamber music gatherings. These took place at a house - located at Calle Talcahuano 1257, Recoleta - owned by Ernesto Rosenthal, a prominent Viennese Jewish businessman and former violinist.]
I've known Martha [born 5 June 1941] since 1949. In Buenos Aires, there was a house belonging to a former violinist and businessman where chamber music was played every Friday. All the great musicians who came to Argentina at that time, like Adolph Busch, Igor Markevitch, and Sergiu Celibidache, could be found there. That's where I first met Martha. I was seven, she was eight, and we played under the piano, as children do. And that same evening, we played for the relatively young Celibidache.
I've known very few people as long as Martha. Even as a child, she had the ability to play the piano in a truly impressive way. From the beginning, she wasn't a mechanical virtuoso focused on dexterity and speed. Of course, she could do that too, but beyond that, she could draw an incredible range of colors from the piano. And she has an imagination in her interpretation that few virtuosos possess.
“We were just normal children”
The piano was always her main instrument. However, she also received some conducting lessons from Hans Swarowsky when the family moved to Vienna in the 1950s. Her mother thought she should be able to conduct as well. It was an interesting circle in Vienna, where Zubin Mehta and Claudio Abbado also studied with Swarowsky.
Martha's mother and my mother were very good friends, but only later, in Europe. In 1949, my family and I moved to Israel. The Argerichs stayed in Argentina and later moved to Vienna. In the years that followed, we had hardly any contact; we were no longer children, but not quite adults either. As children, we didn't talk about music; we were just normal children.
And...
Daniel Barenboim still remembers today, more than 60 years later, that his eight-year-old friend played Chopin's Étude in C-sharp minor from Op. 10 "just as fiery and brilliant as she does today." And Martha Argerich adds: "Daniel played everything . Even back then he had a huge repertoire. My mother always said: 'Oh, why can't you be like Daniel?'"
In a German documentary, they visit this exact house decades later. They stand in the room, reminiscing about the location of the piano and tracing back the roots of their 70+ year friendship.
Martha's immense talent caught the attention of Argentine President Juan Perón and his wife, Evita. Recognising that the young prodigy needed to study with the best masters in Europe, Perón summoned Argerich and her mother to the presidential residence. When he asked what she wanted, the young Argerich bluntly stated she wanted to study with Friedrich Gulda in Vienna.
To facilitate the move, Perón strategically appointed her father, Juan Manuel Argerich, and her mother, Juana Heller, to diplomatic posts at the Argentine embassy in Vienna, ensuring the family's financial stability abroad.Relocation to Europe.
In 1955, at age 14, Argerich moved to Europe. She began intensive studies with the Austrian pianist Friedrich Gulda, whom she considered one of her most influential and cherished mentors.
Just two years after moving to Europe, in 1957, a 16-year-old Argerich won both the Geneva International Music Competition and the Ferruccio Busoni International Piano Competition (Bolzano, Italy) within three weeks of each other.
Wikipedia
Martha Argerich's maternal grandparents were Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire who settled in Colonia Villa Clara in Argentina's Entre Ríos Province, one of the colonies established by Baron de Hirsch and the Jewish Colonization Association.
Argerich began kindergarten around three years old, where she was the youngest child. A five-year-old boy, who was a friend, teased her that she would not be able to play the piano and Argerich responded by playing a piece perfectly by ear. She started learning the piano at the age of three. At the age of five, she began to study under Vincenzo Scaramuzza.
Argerich performed in her first concert in 1949 at the age of eight. Six years later, her family moved to Europe. Argerich studied with Friedrich Gulda in Austria, whom she described as one of her major influences. She later studied with Stefan Askenase and Maria Curcio.
Argerich also studied under Madeleine Lipatti (widow of Dinu Lipatti), Abbey Simon, and Nikita Magaloff. In 195, aged sixteen, she won both the Ferruccio Busoni International Competition and the Geneva International Music Competition.
Following this success Argerich had a personal and artistic crisis. After an attempt to study with the Italian pianist Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, who gave her only four lessons in the space of 18 months, she went to New York City with the intention of studying under Vladimir Horowitz.
For three years, Argerich stopped playing piano and considered pursuing a career as a secretary or doctor. She credited Anny Askenase, the wife of Stefan Askenase, with encouraging her to return to the piano.
Alex Ross, The New Yorker, November 12, 2001
"I was terrible," Martha Argerich said, after drawing hysterical applause with a recent pair of performances at Carnegie Hall. "I was in a strange state. My mind was on other things." Argerich was sitting in a midtown hotel restaurant, amid a motley, lively group of friends. She had just played Beethoven's First Piano Concerto with the Montreal Symphony. The friends, speaking in various accents of Argentina, France, Hungary, and California, protested that she had in fact been stupendous, colossal, magical. The conductor Charles Dutoit, who is nearly as famous for being one of Argerich's former husbands as for leading the Montreal, joined in the campaign of reassurance as he hastened to catch a plane to Paris. "You were not terrible at all, pas du tout," he told her. But Argerich had made up her mind. "I played better in April," she said. She waved the praise away as if it were a silly dessert.
In the restaurant, hours pass and night falls. I feel that I should go, but it is strangely difficult to leave. The cosmopolitan chatter goes on at a dotty pace, as if we had all been thrown together at some turn-of-the-century spa. Argerich is asked why she did not play the concerto by Alberto Ginastera that had been announced for the Carnegie series. "I did not learn it," she replies.
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