This is, nonetheless, what baffled audiences, notably in the West after he fled the Soviet Union in the Twenties, and held him back from public acceptance on a scale matching that of his friend, Rachmaninov, whose music was far more conventionally melodic. The extra I hear his music, actually, the more I feel that he mixed the harmonic language of mid-period Scriabin with a melodic line closer to Mussorgsky. Listen, as an example, to his Vocalise suite; it’s totally fascinating, musically quite complex for late Romantic music, however not in the identical class as Rachmaninov’s far more memorable Vocalise which became an instant “hit” in the classical world. The piano half, as ordinary for Medtner, is very Art & Music complicated, here including some rising chromatic passages in the center that might never have occurred to Rachmaninov…and as quickly as again here, Levental’s soft singing is absolutely exquisite, flawlessly managed …