I like Byron Janis's playing, in general, and his Rachmaninoff concerti are particularly impressive recordings. Though his other recordings are uniformly interesting, he has a tendency to take markedly fast tempi, though rarely completely disconcertingly so (unlike, for example, Argerich, who seems pathologically incapable of playing anything slower than, say, allegretto—even for things marked gravissimo). I think he did a fine job on that great landmark work, Pictures at an Exhibition, which, along with works by Rachmaninoff, Chopin, Schumann, Gershwin, Liszt, and Beethoven, can be found on this nice collection of RCA recordings.

Two things took me a little aback when I decided on this month's CCM. First, that neither Mussorgsky nor his most famous work had ever appeared as a CCM. Second, the striking, though admittedly very surface, resemblances between the opening of the Ballet of Unhatched Chicks and last month's Schoenberg excerpt, something I'd never noticed before (or maybe I'm just overly sensitive to this, having listened to them back-to-back). Anyway, it is neither here nor there, of course.

There is not a lot I want to say about the piece. The Ravel orchestration is one of the most performed pieces in the repertoire, more so than the original piano version by a very long shot. So, I bring great pleasure in bringing you the still-well-known original. Enjoy the chicks!