Junichi Steven Sato.(BRIEFLY NOTED)(Sound recording review)(Brief article)

Junichi Steven Sato. Piano Transciptions. Sato Music Editions SME1001, 2005.

There was a time, before the wide availability of recordings, when piano transcriptions were the only means most people had of becoming acquainted with large-scale classical compositions. Such is no longer the case, and few would dispute that music lovers are vastly better off for the relative prevalence of recordings and accessibility of concert performances in the modern world. But something was certainly lost when the skills of good transcribers lost much of their marketability, as the young Junichi Steven Sato reminds us with this very fine program consisting of two original transcriptions and a rendition of a transcription by Alfred Cortot. For this recording Sato arranged Johann Sebastian Bach's Passacaglia and Fugue in C Minor for Organ (BWV 582) and Franz Liszt's Psalm ...