A superb Kenny Fu on what must be the hottest day of the year .Hotting up inside too with Rachmaninov’s demonic Second Sonata played with remarkable clarity and control as the monstrous technical obstacles just disappeared under his superb musicianship and architectural understand .He created a monument every bit as impressive as the one we were seated in. St James’s Lancaster Gate where I had heard Badura Skoda in what turned out to be his last London recital.
And today Kenny giving one of his first having graduated from the Purcell School and the Royal Academy and now about to perfect his studies in Italy.

The opening Haydn Sonata in E minor immediately showed his musical pedigree from the class of Tatyana Sarkissova Alexeev and Ian Fountain .A spontaneity and crystal clarity with fingers like taut springs with a boundless energy, each one with a subtle voice if its own .The simplicity and poignant beauty of the ‘Adagio’ unfolded with chiselled beauty as he caressed the keys with a natural movement of refined delicacy .The delicious ‘joie de vivre’ of the ‘vivace molto’ brought a hypnotic rhythmic elan to a movement full of concealed charm and wit.

A masterly performance of Schumann’s elusive Humoreske showed not only his kaleidoscopic sense of colour but the passionate musical understanding of a supreme stylist.There was a subtle beauty to the opening as he allowed the music to unfold so poetically with a superb sense of balance.Bursts of energy were played with a clarity but always with the architectural whole in mind. There were moments that were barely whispered with a sense of improvised freedom. A dynamic drive too that was never hard but always with clarity and beauty of sound.Lumimosity and simplicity of the ‘Einfach und Zart’ was followed by quite considerable technical mastery in the continual flow of the Intermezzo .’Innig’ was played with a beautiful melodic outpouring and a subtle sense of colour and rubato.There was nobility in the ‘Mit einigen Pomp’ with magic as a melody appeared in its midst before an exhilarating final bars of great drive and dynamism.

The Rachmaninov Second Sonata was played with sumptuous sound and transcendental virtuosity but again it was the clarity that was so extraordinary .A web of sounds that Kenny could steer through with musicianship and intelligence.There are moments in the Rachmaninov Sonata that are like notes being fired over the keys but there are also moments of intimacy and glowing beauty.Kenny managed to link all these parts together and show us the overall shape of a difficult work that at time borders on hysterical.

Kenny Fu at St Mary’s ‘Rachmaninov ignites and inflames an artist of impeccable musicianship’

Kenny Fu the making of an artist with poetry and intelligence at St Mary’s