Tuesday 1 September 4.00 pm

Streamed LIVE concert in an empty church

Tim Horton (piano)

Mozart: Fantasia in C minor K396
Chopin: Ballade no 1 in G minor Op 23
Chopin: Ballade no 2 in F Op 38

Chopin: Ballade no 3 in A flat Op 47

Chopin: Ballade no 4 in F minor Op 52

Tim Horton studied at Chetham’s School of Music with Charles Hopkins and Heather Slade-Lipkin and graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge in 1995. In the same year he replaced Alfred Brendel at short notice in two performances of Schoenberg’s Piano Concerto with the CBSO and Sir Simon Rattle at Symphony Hall, Birmingham and at the Royal Festival Hall, London. Since then he has played with the RLPO, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, Birmingham Contemporary Music Group and Trondheim Symphony Orchestra.In 2005 Tim was chosen as the scholar of the Klavier Festival Ruhr at the recommendation of Alfred Brendel, an honour that included a recital at the Festival and a bursary. Tim has a duo partnership with cellist Adrian Brendel with whom he has given tours of Spain, Germany, Italy and the UK, including concerts at the Wigmore Hall, London. In 2011 they made their debut at the Enescu Festival in Bucharest. He has played regularly at the Plush, Aldeburgh, Bath and Elverum Festivals and has collaborated with many leading chamber musicians including Paul Lewis, Peter Cropper, the Elias Quartet, the Vertavo Quartet and the members of the Kungsbacka Piano Trio.Tim has been playing with violist Robin Ireland since 2008 and they have toured Britain extensively. Their Nimbus Alliance disc of Shostakovich and Prokofiev was highly acclaimed on its release. They have also released a disc of the Brahms Sonatas and the Schubert Arpeggione Sonata. Along with violinist Benjamin Nabarro and cellist Gemma Rosefield, Tim is a founder member of the internationally acclaimed Leonore Piano Trio.

Hugh Mather and his team have come up trumps yet again with a season of concerts which are innumerable – listed below- giving an opportunity to musicians whether at the beginning of their career or distinguished artists like Norma Fisher who in her celebration year will be giving what promises to be a fascinating talk about her life in music https://christopheraxworthymusiccommentary.wordpress.com/2020/05/18/norma-fisher-a-celebration-in-music/ https://www.academia.edu/43931470/Commentary_Norma_Fisher_a_Celebration_in_Music

The opening concert of this new autumn series was a surprise solo recital by the distinguished chamber music player Tim Horton.A programme that showed off to the full his intelligent musicianship and command of the keyboard.The Mozart Fantasia K.396 of such clarity and subtle phrasing it was the ideal opening work in a programme that was dedicated principally to  Chopin’s Four Ballades .

His intelligence  and lack of rhetoric was indeed refreshing and nowhere was it more evident than in the first Ballade in G minor .An opening where all Chopin’s most  precise indications were interpreted with a beauty of sound and sense of architecture that gave such poignancy to  a work that all too often is maligned in lesser hands.His sense of control was remarkable and allied to a great sense of balance even the most passionate outbursts were beautifully shaped within a vision of the whole work.

The extreme delicacy of the opening of the second ballade was such a contrast to the Presto con fuoco that follows and the agitato coda as with the G minor Ballade was never allowed to  overwhelm the overall shape.The beautiful lyricism of the third ballade ,the most pastoral of them all, was played with a gentle lilt that was indeed beguiling.The development was masterly played and led so naturally to the final lyrical outburst and the final flourish played with great assurance .The four last chords perfectly shaped without any overt showmanship.The fourth Ballade was played as the absolute masterpiece it is .I found the gentle theme written in two a little agitated and I remember Perlemuter writing so many changes of fingering in my score to find just the right weight and simplicity of this theme that Chopin is to trasform so magically.The final triumphant pages before the coda were played with great control  the melodic line never overpowered by the ever more passionate left hand turbulance.He brought a great calm to the five pianissimo chords before the eruption of the coda.But even here there was always a true musician keeping the technically very complex passages under control and with a shape that was exemplary.A very satisfying view of these four remarkable Ballades lacking maybe a sense of drama and wonder but nevertheless a musicianly account played with total control and a sense of overall shape that was remarkable

Here is the  Autumn Season: