The tour continues …….The Ritz Abano Terme Sala dei Specchi…….we could have danced all night !

The lap of luxury but here more than any other venue on this tour a very small but appreciative after dinner audience ……as Boris Berman would say :’If they don’t want to come you can’t stop them! ‘
Well we didn’t but joined them in the hot outside pool and fabulous White Glove’s Restaurant .

A shorter programme was heard resounding from the beautiful Steinway in the sumptuous Sala dei Specchi.Our dashing young Russian /Scottish virtuoso played his heart out as always and the Schumann Studies were even more full of the subtle sounds and beauty of a supreme stylist.The posthumous studies were indeed strands of gold as they found their real home in this refined atmosphere where beauty was reflected a thousand fold.

‘Sleeping Beauty’ was just the right piece to send us on our slumbers contemplating the multi-coloured breakfast that awaited accompanied by the delicate sounds of the ‘Moonlight’ Sonata discreetly played.Wafting our way again into the hot springs and for those who were foolhardy enough to raise their head there was a minus one temperature waiting to bite it off .

Now ready for the most important concert of this short KT tour for the Squeglia’s historic ‘Incontro sulla Tastiera ‘ in the Teatro Comunale in Vicenza.

Here is a very fine review of a special occasion on what Nikita described as the best instrument he has ever played on – Sokolov likes it too – che non guasta as they say in these parts!

Nikita’s Schumann ‘studies  are canons covered in flowers because he is a supreme stylist …as Schumann was a supreme poet and called them ‘Symphonic’ ……………Studies.

The study ‘Presto Possible’ that everyone fears and more often than not stumble through  he plays perfectly and it just goes to  show his pianistic credentials and  artistic choices- in a word :a real artist.A fine review from someone who really listens but just  needs clarifying on one or two rather fundamental artistic points .

The ravishing ever youthful Marie Antonietta Squeglia, a long – time friend and colleague of Noretta Conci, invites one of the most enticing pianists from the KT stable to give a recital in her prestigious concert series that she holds every season in the Teatro Comunale during the winter months and the historic Teatro Olimpico in the months where heating is no longer needed or indeed allowed.

It was only Rosalyn Tureck who was allowed heating in this historic wooden edifice of Palladio but surrounded by good looking young firemen though …which of course she loved! She was less enamoured by the Borgato piano seated on stage that she was told was Radu Lupu’s favourite instrument .’Tureck only plays Steinway ‘ was her imperious reply as a match worthy of the cup final was played out to the bitter end !

The final concert of this short KT tour with Nikita’s sparring partner Isabella Rossellini in the extraordinary cultural centre that is the Teatro Comunale in Vicenza.

The main 900 seat theatre full to the rafters for a new one woman play and the smaller 400 seat theatre almost as full for Nikita’s final recital for the KT’s 20th Anniversary concert with the Incontri sulla Tastiera.
A concert dedicated for the past eight years to the memory of the mother of Ermanno Detto the ever generous sponsor of the concerts that Fernanda Muraro Detto used to frequent.

Maria Antonietta Squeglia the driving force behind the Incontri concerts was unfortunately laid low with broken vertebrae but her daughter Raffaella was there in her place as was Antonella Bartolomucci who introduced the concert.
Ermanno Detto was our genial host as was the President of Incontri Enrico Hullweck ,ex- Mayor of Vicenza who had battled for many a year to bring to completion this extraordinary modern complex.

A magnificent new Steinway concert grand from the son of Zanta whose father is still the custodian of the magnificent old Steinway in the Sala Dei Giganti in Padua .This piano is the preferred piano of Sokolov and Nikita too said he had never played such a fine instrument .

What could be better for this final concert and Nikita rose to the occasion with performances of subtle beauty and a feeling of recreating works that he had played for four consecutive days.
There were some very subtle shadings and more time taken as certain corners were given an elasticity that can only happen when the performer and audience are united as one.This is surely the reason for live performances especially of well worn masterpieces.
There is an interaction between artist and audience which can illuminate and still find unexpectedly new things without distorting the overall structure or betraying the fidelity to the composer’s intentions .The ‘Gothic Cathedral’ variation ( n. 7 ) was a case in point as the opening majesty gave way to a timelessness like looking in wonder at a monumental edifice.

Nikita could also play much quieter (strange paradox on a larger piano) with whispered sounds of ravishing beauty that drew the audience to him rather than he having to project the sound to them.
Longer silences and held chords daringly allowed more time without breaking the subtle line that holds an interpretation together.Like the man on the high wire daring to risk all in moments when everything seemed to come together so naturally right.One must have the courage to risk and dare as a solo performer – playing safe is something you do in the recording studio as you search for the perfect performance .On stage you are in the circus arena which is only for the very few courageous souls that are prepared to risk all for moments of discovery and recreation.Not necessarily the note picking accuracy that are essential for studio recordings that are going to be listened to over and over again.

Public performance as Nikita showed us today needs to have an element of the showman that can reduce the public to tears and at the drop of a hat have them laughing or seduced by refined sounds and atmospheres.The music must be a living thing when the curtain goes up and the audience must be in your hands to be led on a voyage of discovery together into the very world of the composer they are transmitting.
I often quote the title of an article written in ‘Le Monde de la Musique’ about Shura Cherkassky which summed up in few words his extraordinary artistry : ‘Je joue, je sens, je transmets.’
Nikita today proved himself worthy of this supreme stylist but also with an extraordinary intelligence that could hold together as one Mussorgsky’s monumental ‘ Pictures.’ They were multi-coloured pictures of extraordinarily different character but at the same time pictures that were housed under the same roof of this gallery.There were moments of almost inaudible sounds in the ‘Old Castle’ as there were terrifying outbursts when ‘Baba Yaga’ comes into view.The final pages of the ‘Great Gate’ were breathtaking in their gloriously rich sounds allowed to reverberate around the hall like the echo in a great Cathedral.
The charm and ease that he gave to the encore ‘Un poco di Schumann’ by Tchaikowsky was with the same ease and style that he had brought earlier to three pieces from ‘The Sleeping Beauty Suite.’
It was piano playing of another age where showmanship is combined with the real technical mastery of a kaleidoscope of sounds in each finger.A heart and soul of gold but a mind and fingers of computer – like precision and intelligence – another paradox but then music is a world which is born and takes flight where words are just not enough.

Two triumphs under one roof Isabella Rossellini and Nikita Lukinov united in this magnificent city where Palladio had constructed the first covered theatre. And so as not to frighten the audience he painted clouds on the roof …Italy really is the Museum of the World as Rostropovich so rightly declared and like all art a true Voyage of Discovery.

A stage at the Comunale that we will be sharing with Isabella Rossellini who will be performing her much awaited one woman show on the stage next to ours.

And so a magic carpet will fly our dashing young prince away to the Isle of Man where he will delight even more enthusiastic KT followers with his superb performances of Schumann,Tchaikowsky and Mussorgsky -and also a masterclass and introductory talk for the enthusiastic music lovers on this sceptered Isle

The Symphonic Studies Op. 13, began in 1834 as a theme and sixteen variations on a theme by Baron von Fricken, plus a further variation on an entirely different theme by Heinrich Marschner.The first edition in 1837 carried an annotation that the tune was “the composition of an amateur”: this referred to the origin of the theme, which had been sent to Schumann by Baron von Fricken, guardian of Ernestine von Fricken, the Estrella of his Carnaval op. 9. The baron, an amateur musician, had used the melody in a Theme with Variations for flute. Schumann had been engaged to Ernestine in 1834, only to break abruptly with her the year after. An autobiographical element is thus interwoven in the genesis of the Études symphoniques (as in that of many other works of Schumann’s).Of the sixteen variations Schumann composed on Fricken’s theme, only eleven were published by him. (An early version, completed between 1834 and January 1835, contained twelve movements). The final, twelfth, published étude was a variation on the theme from the Romance Du stolzes England freue dich(Proud England, rejoice!), from Heinrich Marschner’s opera Der Templer und die Judin based on Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe (as a tribute to Schumann’s English friend, William Sterndale Bennett to whom it is dedicated )The earlier Fricken theme occasionally appears briefly during this étude. The work was first published in 1837 as XII Études Symphoniques. Only nine of the twelve études were specifically designated as variations. The entire work was dedicated to Schumann’s English friend, the pianist and composer, and Bennett played the piece frequently in England to great acclaim, but Schumann thought it was unsuitable for public performance and advised his wife Clara not to play it.The highly virtuosic demands of the piano writing are frequently aimed not merely at effect but at clarification of the polyphonic complexity and at delving more deeply into keyboard experimentation.

• Theme – Andante [C^♯ minor]
• Etude I (Variation 1) – Un poco più vivo [C^♯ minor]
• Etude II (Variation 2) – Andante [C^♯ minor]
• Etude III – Vivace [E Major]
• Etude IV (Variation 3) – Allegro marcato [C^♯ minor]
• Etude V (Variation 4) – Scherzando [C^♯ minor]
• Etude VI (Variation 5) – Agitato [C^♯ minor]
• Etude VII (Variation 6) – Allegro molto [E Major]
• Etude VIII (Variation 7) – Sempre marcatissimo [C^♯ minor]
• Etude IX – Presto possibile [C^♯ minor]
• Etude X (Variation 8) – Allegro con energia [C^♯ minor]
• Etude XI (Variation 9) – Andante espressivo [G^♯ minor]
• Etude XII (Finale) – Allegro brillante (based on Marschner’s theme) [D^♭ Major]

On republishing the set in 1890, Johannes Brahms restored the five variations that had been cut by Schumann. These are now often played, but in positions within the cycle that vary somewhat with each performance; there are now twelve variations and these five so-called “posthumous” variations which exist as a supplement.

The five posthumously published sections (all based on Fricken’s theme) are:

• Variation I – Andante, Tempo del tema
• Variation II – Meno mosso
• Variation III – Allegro
• Variation IV – Allegretto
• Variation V – Moderato.

• Moderato.

In 1834, Schumann fell in love with Ernestine von Fricken, a piano student of Friedrich Wieck, and for a time they seemed destined to marry. The relationship did not last—Schumann got cold feet after he learned that she had been born out of wedlock—but it inspired some notable music. Carnaval, Op. 9, a set of character pieces for piano, is based on a four-note motive derived from the name of Ernestine’s home town. The Etudes symphoniques, Op. 13, are variations on a theme by Ernestine’s father, Ignaz Ferdinand von Fricken, a nobleman and amateur composer. Of course, Schumann eventually transferred his affections to Clara Wieck, and it was she who gave the first performance of the Etudes symphoniques, in 1837. The piece was published by Haslinger that same year, with a dedication to the English composer William Sterndale Bennett rather than to Ernestine. A revised version appeared in 1852.

Our manuscript is a sketch that includes the theme and variations 1, 2, 5, 10, 12, as well as five others that were not published until 1873, in an appendix edited by none other than Johannes Brahms. It formerly belonged to Alice Tully (1902–1993), the philanthropist whose name graces a concert hall in Lincoln Center. She gave it to Vladimir Horowitz (who counted Schumann’s music among his many specialties in the piano repertoire), and two years after his death, his widow Wanda Toscanini Horowitz donated it to Yale. The other principal manuscript source for this piece belongs to the library of the Royal Museum of Mariemont, in Belgium.

Pictures at an Exhibition is based on pictures by the artist, architect, and designer Viktor Hartmann. It was probably in 1868 that Mussorgsky first met Hartmann, not long after the latter’s return to Russia from abroad. Both men were devoted to the cause of an intrinsically Russian art and quickly became friends. They met in the home of the influential critic Vladimir Stasov, who followed both of their careers with interest. According to Stasov’s testimony, in 1868, Hartmann gave Mussorgsky two of the pictures that later formed the basis of Pictures at an Exhibition.

Concert Suite from the Ballet ‘The Sleeping Beauty’
Prologue
Dance of Pages
Vision
Andante
Fairy of Silver
The Pussed Tom-Cat and the White Cat
Gavotte
The Singing Canary
Little Red Riding Hood and Wolf
Adagio
Finale

PICTURES AT AN EXHIBITION Promenade l
The Gnomes
Promenade ll
The Old Castle
Promenade lll
The Tuileries: Children’s dispute
after play
Bydlo
Promenade IV
Ballet of the unhatched chicks
Two Polish Jews: Rich and poor
Promenade V
The market at Limoges
Roman Catacombs – With the dead
in a dead language
Baba Yaga: The Witch
The Heroes Gate at Kiev

Hartmann’s sudden death on 4 August 1873 from an aneurysm shook Mussorgsky along with others in Russia’s art world. The loss of the artist, aged only 39, plunged the composer into deep despair. Stasov helped to organize a memorial exhibition of over 400 Hartmann works in the Imperial Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg in February and March 1874. Mussorgsky lent the exhibition the two pictures Hartmann had given him, and viewed the show in person, inspired to compose Pictures at an Exhibition, quickly completing the score in three weeks (2–22 June 1874).Five days after finishing the composition, he wrote on the title page of the manuscript a tribute to Vladimir Stasov, to whom the work is dedicated.The music depicts his tour of the exhibition, with each of the ten numbers of the suite serving as a musical illustration of an individual work by Hartmann.Although composed very rapidly, during June 1874, the work did not appear in print until 1886, five years after the composer’s death, when a not very accurate edition by the composer’s friend and colleague Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov was published.

Mussorgsky suffered personally from alcoholism, it was also a behavior pattern considered typical for those of Mussorgsky’s generation who wanted to oppose the establishment and protest through extreme forms of behavior.One contemporary notes, “an intense worship of Bacchus was considered to be almost obligatory for a writer of that period.”Mussorgsky spent day and night in a Saint Petersburg tavern of low repute, the Maly Yaroslavets, accompanied by other bohemian dropouts. He and his fellow drinkers idealized their alcoholism, perhaps seeing it as ethical and aesthetic opposition. This bravado, however, led to little more than isolation and eventual self-destruction.