‘Horowitz in Vienna’ at 83

With not a wisp of documentary footage in sight, “Horowitz in Vienna” (Deutsche Grammophon Video, $35) is a straight snapshot of one of Vladimir Horowitz’s final concerts, held in Vienna’s Musikverein on the afternoon (naturally) of May 31, 1987.

Though his fingers are gnarled and craggy, Horowitz was amazingly well-preserved at 83; only in the now-teasing, now-thundering rendition of Chopin’s A-flat Polonaise does his technique significantly betray him. Like most of his final concerts, this was mostly an affectionate revisit to his core 19th-Century repertory, a program designed to keep the old fierce sonorities under wraps most of the time. The sole rare entry in the Horowitz catalogue is Mozart’s Rondo in D, K. 485, played in a mellow, gorgeously shaded fashion.

Brian Large’s direction reduces everything to the absolute minimum; the face, profile and hands of Horowitz is all you get.

(Those who want more than just a bare-bones Horowitz concert should try the absorbing documentary, “The Last Romantic,” from Pioneer Artists.)

For those who merely want to bask in the electronic presence of the legend, or for pianists eager to uncover clues on How He Did It, this will be enough. And the sound is so revealing that in the middle of Schubert’s G-flat Impromptu, you can faintly hear church bells tolling outside the hall, a ghostly counterpoint for a pianist nearing the sunset of his Indian summer.