No Longer Silenced

By Christopher Porterfield

Unearthed

America's first great piano virtuoso was a darkly handsome, intense young New Yorker named William Kapell. He had it all: a staggering technique, passion and an artistic instinct that pierced to the heart of every piece. In 1953 he died in a plane crash at 31. All that remained were his legend and a handful of recordings. Then in 2004 a trove of new Kapell performances surfaced, recorded at home by Australian department-store salesman Roy Preston from radio broadcasts of Kapell's final tour. A selection of those recordings is now being released in a two-disc set, WILLIAM KAPELL REDISCOVERED. Here, Kapell powerfully revisits some of his previously recorded repertory, especially Rachmaninoff and Mussorgsky, and displays a deepening mastery of Bach, Mozart, Chopin and Debussy. Preston, alas, was no audio engineer; his recordings hiss and crackle. But fortunately only the sound of the piano is marred. Kapell's talent comes blazing through.