Carlos Manuel Vargas: Souvenirs
Navona Records

Pianist Carlos Vargas is clearly no minimalist. Throughout his solo piano set Souvenirs, he embroiders its pieces' melodies with elaborate runs, making for a musical effect that's at times oceanic and engulfing. It's easy to be swept away by his playing, as well as by the material he chose for the recording. In coupling classical pieces by French and Russian composers with ones by Heitor Villa-Lobos and George Gershwin (by way of arranger Earl Wild), Souvenirs captures the range of Vargas's interests and technical command. He's as comfortable essaying a Scriabin sonata as he is virtuosic reimaginings of Gershwin standards. Further to that, Vargas's skill-set is such that he operates with equal authority in classical and jazz-styled modes. The impression is often created of a conservatory-trained jazz pianist who uses his highly developed technique to invigorate a songbook standard in fresh and illuminating ways.

In addition to ones by the aforementioned figures, works by Francis Poulenc, Louis Guglielmi Louiguy, Marguerite Monnot, José María Vitier, Osvaldo Golijov and Rafael Bullumba Landestoy appear, making for an eclectic set-list that travels to multiple countries and centuries. Souvenirs is ultimately one thing more than any other, a reflection of Vargas's personal influences and musical interests. To that end, it's as much informed by this Dominican Republic native's Latin American roots and classical training as his love for French ballads and jazz standards. In being so personally programmed, the release comes across as a sincere and genuine self-portrait, even if the works were authored by others. Vargas, who currently calls Boston home and is a piano faculty member at Berklee's Boston Conservatory and at the New School of Music in Cambridge, recorded the set at a Boston studio on April 26, 2022.

Opening with an arresting splash, Villa-Lobos's Impressões Seresteiras entrances immediately with sinuous melodies, romantic drama, and an at times intense, Rachmaninoff-like character. Vargas amplifies such qualities in his performance, which shows marked sensitivity to pacing and dynamics. While his virtuosic technique is called upon for the execution of the complex passages, his handling of the hushed episodes impresses too. An aura of romantic longing instates itself with the advent of two etude-fashioned Gershwin treatments, with “The Man I Love” given an emphatic makeover and “Embraceable You” transformed into an hypnotic tone poem—a particularly striking example of Vargas's penchant for reimagination. Matching these songs for impact are two Piaf-related pieces, Poulenc's Hommage à Edith Piaf and a Roberto Piana arrangement of Louis Guglielmi Louiguy's “La vie en Rose.” Whereas the former engages for its heartfelt lyricism, the latter does the same in giving pianistic voice to its bewitching melodies. Piana's also represented by an arrangement that recasts Monnot's “Hymne a l'amour” as an affecting elegy.

Three Landestoy settings appear, Romántico haunting in its expression of yearning, Vals Santo Domingo breezy, carefree, and buoyed by a lilting waltz pulse, and Estudio en Zamba energized by a joyful swing that's an indebted to Latin as jazz. A more sober and sombre side of the recording emerges via Alexander Scriabin's Sonata Fantasy - Piano Sonata No. 2 in G Sharp minor Op. 19, its regal “Andante” articulated with delicacy and feeling by the pianist and the “Presto” dazzling in its high-velocity flow. At album's end, Golijov's rousing Levante provides one final example of Vargas's skill at executing intricate, rhythmically driven material.

June 2024