RPO, Kurt Masur, Royal Festival Hall, Rachmaninov ‘Paganini’ Rhapsody

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The Daily Telegraph, 1 March 1978, Peter Stadlen.
RPO/Masur/Woodward -  Rachmaninov’s ‘Paganini’ Rhapsody
...Hovering between these extremes was Rachmaninov’s ‘Paganini’ Rhapsody.  Indeed not the least merit of Roger Woodward’s deliciously poker-faced reading was to keep us guessing most of the time whether or not he, and his composer, were in earnest.  No such doubts, to be sure, during the gradiloquence of the large slow pseudo-Viennese section….. elsewhere I realised his drily laconic touch, burlesque interjections and last, not least, his superb pianism.