The young Sienese pianist Ludovico Troncanetti made his debut for the Young Artists Series at the Roma Tre University.

On a fine Schimmel in the magnificent Aula Magna of the University which is just one of the venues open to young artists by this enlightened university.

Teatro Palladium and the Teatro of Villa Torlonia are the other two venues the director of studies proudly informed me.A “Maurizio Baglini project” together with Roberto Prosseda from 13 to 16 December was the most recent event in Villa Torlonia (both former KCT artists)

Piero Rattalino one of the most eminent piano experts and author of an enormous quantity of learned tomes on piano and pianists presented the concert.

Explaining in just a few words the origin of the scale and the difference between major and minor to introduce us to the subtle world of Schumann and in particular his Papillons op 2 that was the opening work in the programme.

The other work of Schumann: Kinderszenen op 15 written ,as Rattalinio pointed,out with children in mind but by no means for children to play.

This Aula Magna a very prestigious venue in which Ludovico Troncanetti had been invited to perform.

He was born in Siena in 1991 where he received his early training and later graduated from the Conservatory “G,Verdi” in Milan.

Since 2009 he has been studying with Leslie Howard with whom since 2016 he has formed a piano duo that tours quite regularly in Italy.

In January 2018 they gave the first performance in Italy at the Teatro dei Rozzi in Siena of Rubinstein’s Fantasia op 73 for two pianos.

The four Sonatas for solo piano by Rubinstein are being recorded by Ludovico Troncanetti for issue on CD for Movimento Classical.

It was the first Sonata of Anton Rubinstein that Ludovico Troncanetti chose to offer as an encore after a rather conventional programme that obviously was what the University had requested.

This of course was the marvellous folly that I was referring to above.

A very professionally played Schumann in which his musicianship and sense of line were always to the fore.

A very fine sense of balance that allowed the melodic line to sing in a very pure and unimpeded way with some very subtle colouring.

A scintillating performance of the Mephisto Waltz n.2 was followed by a rather strange performance of the famous Hungarian Rhapsody n.2.

Announcing that this was his own arrangement and not the original that Professor Rattalino had described in his introduction.I must say I prefer the original version but it was good to see that Ludovico Troncanetti had put away his scores and was obviously warming up for what he had up his sleeve as an encore!

I had told Ludovico Troncanetti that of course the University quite rightly could chose a programme that would suit their needs but no one could then order an encore.

It was Serkin who famously played the Aria from the Goldberg Variations after a performance of the 5th Brandenburg Concerto ……….but over an hour later he was back to the Aria!

It has gone down in history of course.

Ludovico in true Sienese spirit announced a movement at a time …glancing at me as was noticed by one of the audience who at the after concert reception asked me if I was his father!

Not quite but I did meet my wife in Siena in 1978 and had spent many summers there with the great pianist and pedagogue Guido Agosti!

Here,at last, we were treated to the pianist who liberated from the score played with such mastery and ease.

His whole body movements although like his master Leslie Howard are never exaggerated, were totally in consonance with the music.

Great technical prowess but at the service of the music.

Noticeable in particular in the complex fourth movement where the left hand has some extraordinarily difficult passages that were played with a clarity and astonishing dexterity.

The slow movement was played with a subtle sense of rubato and such a rich and sumptuous palate of colours one wonders why the sonatas have been neglected for so long.

Only three of the four movements offered rather mischievously on this occasion make one wish to hear the whole sonata by this gifted young man.

I look forward to the imminent release of his new CD of the complete Sonatas.