What better way to spend the evening than in the company of two friends making music together in the sumptuous surrounds of the Matthiesen Gallery.

The beautiful Yamaha C 7 piano generously loaned by the Imogen Cooper Music Trust which like Patrick Matthiesen and the indomitable Mary Orr are helping exceptionally talented young musicians to take their rightful place in an overcrowded music profession.

When the two young artists are called Ariel Lanyi and Mihaly Berecz you can expect sparks to be flying as intensity and musical integrity unite.Two major young artists making a name for themselves in the profession after having been friends at the Royal Academy of Music where they were both in the class of Hamish Milne /Ian Fountain.

Of the so-called “Viennese masters,” only Schubert was actually born and raised in that city. Surprisingly, this composer of more than 600 art songs, or Lieder, and numerous sonatas for piano did not, for most of his life, own a piano. A great deal of composing was done at a writing table and revised later at a borrowed piano in the home of a friend.

Schubert left the largest number of piano duets and four-hand works of all the great composers. His Rondo, D. 951, dates from 1828, the last year of his life. Schubert began writing the Fantasia also in January 1828 in Vienna. The work was completed in March of that year, and first performed in May. Schubert’s friend Eduard von Bauernfeld recorded in his diary on May 9 that a memorable duet was played, by Schubert and Franz Lachner. The work was dedicated to Caroline Esterházy, with whom Schubert was in (unrequited) love.

Schubert died in November 1828. After his death, his friends and family undertook to have a number of his works published. This work is one of those pieces; it was published by Anton Diabelli in March 1829.

Ariel and Mihaly began the concert with the Reger transcription of the Brandenburg Concerto n. 6 BWV 1051 by J.S. Bach, which had been written to make these master works more accessible to a larger public.It was played with great rhythmic intensity and a superb sense of balance. Ariel in the bass sustaining the joyous outpourings from Mihaly’s inspired fingers with an infectious ‘joie de vivre’ and crystal clear simplicity that the Genius from Kothen could weave with incredible mellifluous invention.There was the austere intensive beauty of the Adagio and the knotty twine of the final Allegro that was played with a buoyancy and hypnotic rhythmic elan.

The Schubert that followed was played with the same intensity and scrupulous musical integrity of these two major young artists. But playing together in the intimate relationship that four hands on one piano must inevitably be, means that there can be a freedom and flexibility and a sense of searching for colours by means of a chameleonic search for colour together and inevitably an ultra sensitive sense of balance that can only be created with years of working together as a duo.The intensity and musicianship they brought to these two works was remarkable but the etherial magic and breathtaking beauty eluded them.It was obviously their choice to interpret Schubert as Beethoven but the difference is that everything Schubert wrote was of song ,like Chopin ,whereas Beethoven was more orchestral.There were of course many beautiful things where the burning intensity of Ariel took our breath away in the Rondo as the beauty of the theme from the hands of Mihály was beautifully shaped if lacking in fluidity and colour which strangely he found in the final bars when he ventured on high with a final timeless ornament that suddenly opened the heavens.

The Fantasie had Ariel at the helm and Mihály at the steering wheel.A beautiful flowing tempo allowed this magical melody to expand and breathe as the bel canto was a glimpse of the paradise that awaited Schubert in the all too near future.The Largo was played with a rhythmic drive and dynamic seriousness that was more of Beethoven at his most imperious and this was obviously the choice of these two remarkable thinking musicians.It was played with remarkable unity and musical intent and might have been a contrast if the Scherzo could have had more elegance and charm and not been of such Beethovenian seriousness.The final fugato was a tour de force of musicianship and duo playing and here all the dynamic drive and energy were used to overwhelming effect rarely experienced in this much played work.The return of the opening was played with extraordinary sensitivity but just missed the etherial fluidity that could have been such a contrast to the final chords that were of true Beethovenian intensity.

Ariel is a remarkable artist who has been touched by the Gods as has Mihály but they are more in tune with the three B’s than the two S’s.B’s need intellectual intelligence and kapellmeister musicianship .The S’s need charm and lightness even capricious seductiveness that is not part of their genes at the moment.Schumann was played with enviable seriousness and integrity, but was the opening really ‘Lebhaft’ as it progressed ,intense and driven, missing the romantic sweep like the opening of a window to let the intoxicating air in.Instead there was indeed remarkable rhythmic drive but where playful lightness might have created more character.The second was played with beautiful long lines shaped with noble sentiments and a really exquisite featherlight ending.The third ‘Im Volkston ‘ suited these two very intense young musicians with it’s it noble opening bursting into rumbustious dance.

The fourth ,that by specific request of Sir Norman Rosenthal was repeated as and encore, was beautifully shaped, elegant and flowing.The fifth ‘Lebhaft’ was played rather too seriously, very dramatic where Schumann’s flight of fancy hardly took wing.The final piece flowed beautifully and its triumphant ending brought words of praise from Sir Norman for a work that he confessed he had never heard.These two remarkable young musicians have the makings of a life long duo but it just needs time to share this voyage of discovery together .A world of wonder and ethereal beauty is there waiting for these four extraordinarily talented young hands to delve deep into the heart of the piano and find the sounds that are there for those that seek.

This is Martha Argerich and Daniel Barenboim childhood friends sharing the secrets they have learnt after a lifetime of music making Q.E.D:

https://youtu.be/qfMU1jORNyA?feature=shared

Here too are Radu Lupu and Murray Perahia playing the F minor Fantasie https://youtu.be/iJhL-cFQh58?feature=shared

Dear Ariel and Mihály Rubinstein sums it up beautifully :https://youtu.be/gex0sOR7XZ0?feature=shared

Prof Matthiesen had just returned from Florence where he was generously sponsoring a concert of The Beethoven Trilogy with the prestigious Amici della Musica.

The Beethoven trilogy with Anne Queffélec who had encountered a kindred spirit at the Leeds Piano Competition many years ago ,Imogen Cooper, with whom she has formed a formidable long standing piano duet partnership. The music profession may be overcrowded but when you are talking about real dedicated interpreters they are few and far between these days.

It was wonderful to hear of the triumph in Florence just last Sunday and to know that Patrick M was back in his gallery, equally as beautiful, to share in the success of these two young aspiring musicians.I was in Florence too a few day’s earlier with another young musician in the series of concerts of the Keyboard Trust, British Institute and Robert Turnbull Piano Foundation in the Harold Acton Library https://christopheraxworthymusiccommentary.com/2024/11/14/misha-kaploukhii-in-florence-and-milan-for-the-keyboard-trust-and-robert-turnbull-piano-foundation/