What a relief to shelter from the sweltering heat and spend an hour with music of such radiance and beauty from a husband and wife dream team . A moving mixture of Schubert ‘Winterreise’ and Vaughan Williams ‘Songs of Travel’ .

The programme is titled ‘Journey 100’, commemorating the 100thy anniversary of the birth of the German baritone Dietrich Fischer- Dieskau (1925- 2012) who was an enormously influential artist and for many ,his voice epitomises a refined lyrical ,articulate manner of performance through which the poetry shines.

The programme’s journey visits two major,and very different, landmarks of music of music history’s large corpus of ‘wayfaring’ or ‘wandering’ songs.The splitting of cycles and the rapid moves between Schubert and Vaughan Williams encourage us to consider various things beyond their musical and poetic differences – the nature of song programming and performance norms over time, for instance, and the interventions made by composers, authors,performers,publishers and others that trouble perceptions of cycles solely as linear wholes.That this concert begins with ‘Der Leiermann’ uproots any preconceptions that the journey might be linear: the song’s status as the stark ending of Winterise is iconic, and placing it at the start allows us to encounter its eerie, repetitive sound-world without then weight of the 23 preceding songs, and without context for the protagonist’s unsettling questions.

A beauty of diction that made the song sheet superfluous especially when the pianist could highlight and illuminate even the tinkle from a stray mobile!

John Humphreys comments : ‘I had a mobile going off in ‘Der Leiermann’ once…stopped playing, silence, started again, same mobile ringing. To be fair the offender apologised afterwards and said she was phoning to see if someone could offer the organ grinder a bed for the night…!’

Wonderfully cool oasis of civilised culture whilst London seethes with scantily clad tourists intent on drinking the city dry !

Mikhail Timoshenko
Baritone
Known for his “rare sound beauty, powerful and balsamic at the same
time” (Tagesspiegel), baritone Mikhail Timoshenko is a sought-after guest on international opera and concert stages.
Highlights of his first professional seasons include the premiere of the chamber opera En Silence by Alexandre Desplat at the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord in Paris, Figaro in Le nozze di Figaro at the Opéra national de Lorraine in Nancy, Ottokar in Der Freischütz at the Konzerthaus Berlin, Albert in Werther at the Opéra de Lausanne,
Marcello in La bohème at the Opéra National du Capitole de Toulouse, and Papageno in Die Zauberflöte in Montpellier.
His future highlights include Chtchelkalov (Boris Godunov) in Paris/Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, Le Tribut de Zamora (Ch. Gounod) in St. Etienne, Marcello at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and in the Festival de Sanxay, Papageno at Paris-
Bastille, as well as concerts with Elitsa Desseva in Linz, Boswil, Paris.
Mikhail is a recipient of numerous awards, including the 1st Prize at the I Concours International de Chant des Châteaux en Médoc-Bordeaux and the Siemens Opera Contest France, the Prix Lyrique du Cercle Carpeaux and the Prix de l’AROP of the Opera national de Paris, and the Maria Callas International Grand Prix in Athens. In
duo with pianist Elitsa Desseva, he won first prizes at the International Chamber Music Competition “Franz Schubert and Modern Music” in Graz, the International Competition for Song Art of the Hugo Wolf Academy in Stuttgart, and the Wigmore Hall/Independant Opera Song Competition in London, among other prizes at the International Schubert Lied-Duo Competition in Dortmund and the Concours
International de Musique de chambre in Lyon.
As a concert singer, he has worked with conductors such as Teodor Currentzis, Manfred Honeck, Philippe Herreweghe, Markus Poschner, and Emmanuelle Haim.
His performances as a song interpreter together with Elitsa Desseva have captivated the demanding audiences in London, Berlin, Paris, Moscow, Stuttgart, Vienna, and many other major stages across Europe.
He began his artistic training in Mednogorsk (Russia) in the vocal class of Tatiana Mayorova and, after studying in Weimar and Berlin with Michail Lanskoi, joined the Academy of the Opéra National de Paris in 2015. He played the lead role in the documentary film “L’Opéra” by Jean-Stéphane Bron.
Philanthropy is a cause close to Mikhail’s heart. Since 2009, he has been giving charity concerts for children with mental disorders in Russia. In collaboration with the NGO “Touch” in Orenburg and the Center for Social Adaptation “Majak” in Orsk,
he supports several boarding schools for mentally disabled children.

”From the first note we are captivated by Elitsa Desseva’s playing and will remain so until the end of the concert.”

“Elitsa Desseva finds in these scores the means to showcase beautiful sensitivity, delivering performance where voices of such rich texture are seldom heard.”

Praised by critics for the “ecstatic creative power” of her performance (ONLINE MERKER), Bulgarian pianist Elitsa Desseva specialises in the collaboration with singers and is recognised as a leading song pianist of her generation. Elitsa attracted international attention after winning some of the world’s most renowned Lied competitions in just two years. In a duo with her regular partner baritone Mikhail Timoshenko, she reached the final of the Wigmore Hall/Independent Opera Song Competition (United Kingdom), where Mikhail was awarded 1st prize. Furthermore duo Timoshenko-Desseva received 1st prize at the International Art Song Competition Stuttgart (Germany), 1st prize at the Franz Schubert and Modern Music International Competition in Graz (Austria), 2nd prize and Audience Award at the International Schubert Competition Dortmund (Germany), 3rd prize and Audience Award at the Concours International de Musique de Chambre de Lyon (France) and the 18. Nordfriesischer Liedpreis des Ministeriums für Bildung, Wissenschaft und Kultur des Landes Schleswig-Holstein. In the early stages of her international career, alongside mezzo-soprano Polina Artsis Elitsa won 1st prizes at both the International Student Lied Duo Competition in Groningen (Netherlands) and the Internationaler Karl-Adler-Jugendmusikwettbewerb in Stuttgart (Germany). As a soloist Elitsa received several awards including the Bela Bartok Prize at the Ile-de-France International Piano Competition in Paris (France), the 1st Prize at the Liszt-Bartok Piano Competition in Sofia (Bulgaria), DAAD Prize and Deutschland-Stipendium. Receiving the Foundation Yordan Kamdzhalov prize culminated in her performance of Liszt’s Piano Concerto No. 2 at the International Festival ‘Balabanov’s House Music Days’ in Plovdiv. In 2024, Elitsa Desseva, together with baritone Mikhail Timoshenko, released a critically acclaimed CD with Hänssler Classic (Eduard Erdmann: Lieder), featuring world premieres of songs by Eduard and Irene Erdmann as well as songs by Philipp Jarnach. Their dedication to exploring unknown and captivating composers is further highlighted by their recording of Jacques Ibert’s “Quatre chansons de Don Quichotte” for B-Records (Aimer a loisir). Elitsa has also premiered works by Isabel Mundry, Bec Plexus (Brechtje) and Sehyung Kim. Passionate about programming and concert design, Elitsa strives to break the barrier between audience and performers, forging new, emotionally charged, and authentic connections that attract younger and wider audiences to song recitals. Together with Mikhail Timoshenko, she curated a series of concerts for the Académie Orsay-Royaumont in dialogue with the collection of the Musée d’Orsay Paris in 2021. For Jorg Widmann’s milestone birthday, commissioned by the Heidelberger Frühling Liedfestival, they created the recital “Alaverdi” in 2023, transforming the stage into a Georgian birthday celebration where performers and audience members exchanged toasts in poetry and songs. Curious to explore the depth of the Lied genre through the lens of a composer, Elitsa presented her composition “Gift”, a song based on a poem by Barbara Kennedy, together with baritone David Kennedy at the LiedBasel Festival in 2024. This piece, an experiment in contemporary song, “captivated audiences with its unusual piano sounds” (DAS OPERNMAGAZIN). Elitsa has collaborated with numerous distinguished musicians, performing alongside celebrated singers such as Angelika Kirchschlager, Thomas Hampson, and her regular partner, baritone Mikhail Timoshenko. Elitsa regularly appears at major music centers and festivals worldwide, including Wigmore Hall in London, Musée d’Orsay in Paris, Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Pierre Boulez Saal in Berlin, Musikverein in Vienna, Théâtre du Capitole in Toulouse, Brucknerhaus in Linz, France Musique in Paris, Festival Heidelberger Frühling, Sommerliche Musiktage Hitzacker, Grachten Festival in Amsterdam, Festival Young Artists in Bayreuth, Festival Boswiller Frühling, and the Seiji Ozawa Matsumoto Festival in Japan. Her performances have been broadcast on prestigious platforms like BBC Radio 3, Radio France, NDR, Südtirol Radio, SWR, Bulgarian National Radio, Dutch Radio 4, and NHK World Japan. Invited by Thomas Hampson in 2022, Elitsa now serves as the study directorand academy pianist at the prestigious Heidelberg Liedakademie, becoming the first female song accompanist to hold this position. In this role, she accompanies masterclasses led by Thomas Hampson and other distinguished musicians. Additionally, she provides coaching in concert programming and design, guiding the scholars of the Liedakademie to discover their unique artistic voices. As a result, they create Lied recitals showcased at the Schubert-Week in Pierre Boulez Saal Berlin and the Heidelberger Frühling Liedfestival.  Elitsa has further enhanced her skills through a practicum at the Opera Studio of the Vienna Staatsoper and developed a strong professional bond with voice teacher KS Angelika Kirchschlager, actively participating in her singing lessons at the mdw – Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst Wien. Committed to making Lied concerts more engaging, Elitsa will conduct workshops on programming Lied in a concert (Lied.GESTALTUNG) at the Franz Schubert und Musik der Moderne Competition in Graz in 2025. Born in Bulgaria, Elitsa Desseva began her musical journey at the age of four, singing in choirs and touring the country as a soloist. Her passion for music led her to the piano at the age of six in her hometown of Sofia, where she made her debut at ten with the Sofia Sinfonietta Orchestra. This early immersion in vocal music naturally evolved into a profound dedication to the piano, ultimately leading her to become a song accompanist.Elitsa continued her studies in piano, chamber music, and Lied with Balázs Szokolay and Thomas Steinhöfel at the Hochschule für Musik in Weimar. She then pursued her Master’s Degree in song interpretation at the Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst in Vienna under Charles Spencer and Markus Hadulla. Throughout her education, Elitsa received notable mentorship from distinguished musicians such as singers Thomas Hampson, Mitsuko Shirai, Véronique Gens, Angelika Kirchschlager, Brigitte Fassbaender, Ian Bostridge, and pianists Hartmut Höll, Piotr Anderszewski, Dalton Baldwin, Graham Johnson, Susan Manoff, Julius Drake, Malcolm Martineau, and Helmut Deutsch.She is a former scholar of the Heidelberg Lied Academy, Academy LiedBASEL, and Académie Orsay-Royaumont. Additionally, Elitsa is a Britten Pears Young Artistand a Yehudi Menuhin LIFE Music Now artist. She has received the Anny Felbermayer Preis and is a member of the International Hugo Wolf Academy.

Elitsa is currently based in Vienna.

Winterreise  by Franz Schubert D.911, published as op. 89 in 1828), a setting of 24 poems by German poet Wilhelm Müller. It is the second of Schubert’s two song cycles on Müller’s poems, the earlier being Die schöne Müllerin (D. 795, Op. 25, 1823). It consists of a monodrama  from the point of view of the wandering protagonist, in which concrete plot is somewhat ambiguous. After his beloved falls for another, the grief-stricken young man steals away from town at night and follows the river and steep ways to a charcoal burner’s hut, where he rests before moving on. He comes across a village, passes a crossroads, and arrives at a cemetery. Here being denied even the death on which he has become fixated, he defiantly renounces faith before reaching a point of resignation. Finally he encounters a derelict street musician, the only instance in the cycle in which another character is present. The mysterious and ominous nature of the musician, along with the question posed in the last lines, leave the fate of the wanderer open to interpretation.

Songs of Travel is a song cycle  of nine songs originally written for baritone voice composed by Ralph Vaughan Williams , with poems drawn from the Robert Louis Stevenson  collection Songs of Travel and Other Verses . A complete performance of the entire cycle lasts between 20 and 24 minutes.

They were originally written for voice and piano. Vaughan Williams orchestrated the first, third, and eighth songs, and his assistant Roy Douglas later orchestrated the remaining songs using the same instrumentation. The orchestral version has often been recorded but not always with Douglas acknowledged as its co-orchestrator.

• Saturday, June 28, 2025
• 7:00 PM  9:00 PM.
• St John’s WaterlooWaterloo RoadLondon, England, SE1 8TYUnited Kingdom 

Miracles in Waterloo yesterday with an international barrister who can play the socks off most professional pianists . A concert cellist who conducts like Gergiev and the Renaissance man who is realising his dream of uniting the world on wings of song .

Paul Wee was discovered by the renowned piano file Bryce Morrison, playing at the Thalberg society of Mark Viner . He was so impressed that he immediately arranged a CD recording that was received with five star reviews and the rest is history. As Paul says Bryce has a lot to answer for! Margarita Balanas the renowned cellist and now assistant to Paavo Järvi . Raffaello Morales, the Renaissance man, pianist , physicist, investment banker, conductor, cordon bleu cook and founder of the Fidelio café and also author of his first novel of dreams and music :’The Earth to the Skies’. I was privileged to be at the rehearsal and be present at the creation of such sumptuous music making amongst such dedicated and talented young musicians reaching for the skies on wings of song.

Rachmaninov’s third concerto with barrister-pianist Paul Wee and Shostakovich’s portrait of Stalin conducted by Margarita Balanas.

Pianist-barrister Paul Wee, whose recordings for BIS have attracted much praise, was the soloist for Rachmaninov’s mythical third piano concerto, a piece that since its appearance in 1909 has caused many sleepless nights to the best interpreters for almost a century. 

The music of Sergej Rachmaninov seems to merge the many cultures its author would be exposed to throughout his life. The Russian childhood, the fascination for Europe, the American exile, the Middle-Eastern harmonies. Dismissed by many critics as a sideshow to the great experimental musical output of the first half of the twentieth century, the undeniable charm of Rachmaninov’s works calls for a reassessment of the ‘intellectual solipsism’ that the ‘cultural hegemony’ has, for too long, imposed on posterity, to the detriment of the cultural advancement of societies. 

Shostakovich published his tenth symphony after Stalin’s death, in 1953, but it is not ascertained whether many of its elements had already been with written long before. What is undeniable is the fact that Shostakovich went back to the symphonic form after a break of eight years, some of his previous works in this form having been harshly criticised by the government. This work surely marks a return of the composer to a very personal style, independent from the restrictions imposed by the regime and by Stalin himself. 

S. Rachmaninov, Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor Op. 30

D. Shostakovich, Symphony No. 10 in E minor Op. 93

Fidelio Orchestra

Paul Wee, Piano

Raffaello Morales, conductor (Rachmaninov)

Margarita Balanas, conductor (Shostakovich)

Hailed as a “ totally astonishing” (BBC Radio 3 Record Review) pianist who “plays the unplayable ” (The Spectator) and “who can equal and, indeed, surpass the musical and technical accomplishments of the biggest names in the profession ” (International Piano), Paul Wee is internationally acclaimed for his “transcendental technical prowess” (ClassicsToday), “ dazzling virtuosity” (BBC Music Magazine), and “consummate musicianship ” (Gramophone). After a number of early appearances, including a concerto début in London’s Royal Albert Hall aged 12, he continued his studies in New York City at the Manhattan School of Music Pre-College division with Nina Svetlanova. After deciding not to pursue a full-time conservatory education or a primary career in the arts, Paul studied law at the University of Oxford, obtaining his BA (Jurisprudence) and BCL from Keble College. He was called to the Bar by Gray’s Inn in 2010, and attempts to balance his love for the piano alongside the demands of a busy practice at the Bar. 

Paul’s recordings for BIS Records have received much critical acclaim. His 2019 debut recording of Alkan’s Symphony for Solo Piano and Concerto for Solo Piano was shortlisted for a Gramophone Award and Limelight’s Recording of the Year in the Instrumental category, and received a Gramophone Editor’s Choice (November 2019) and a Diapason d’Or (January 2020). His 2020 recording of Thalberg’s L’art du chant met with similar praise, being selected as an Instrumental Choice by BBC Music Magazine (January 2021) and a Limelight Editor’s Choice (December 2020). His most recent recording, featuring Liszt’s transcription of Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony and Alkan’s transcription of Mozart’s D minor Piano Concerto K466, was also shortlisted for a Gramophone Award, as well as being Gramophone’s Recording of the Month for December 2022 and ClassicsToday’s Disc of the Year for 2022.

Paul continues to perform as and when his professional commitments permit, as a recital soloist, concerto soloist, and chamber musician, both in his current home city of London and internationally.

Margarita Balanas – Assistant Conductor 2024/25

The Latvian Margarita Balanas is entering her second round as assistant conductor to Paavo Järvi.

Born in Latvia in 1993, Margarita Balanas first attracted attention as a cellist. She won her first competition at the age of 8 and played at London’s Wigmore Hall at 17. She has performed with the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra, played in front of King Charles III when he was still Prince Charles, and has been supported by musicians such as Anne-Sophie Mutter, Lynn Harrell and Gautier Capuçon. She often performs with her sister, the violinist Kristīne Balanas.

Margarita Balanas has also attracted attention as a promising conductor – including with the Ensemble Anonimi, which she founded and which experiments with a wide range of styles and concert formats. Since attending the Academy in Pärnu, she has been part of the large extended Järvi family: she has not only worked with Paavo Järvi, but also with his father Neeme Järvi and his brother Kristian Järvi.

Last season, she succeeded Izabelė Jankauskaitė as Assistant Conductor of our Music Director at the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, and the collaboration has now been extended for a second season. Paavo Järvi says that he only selects talented people for these positions who he believes will have a real career as a conductor: “It’s more mysterious than ever today what it takes to be a conductor, but you can tell straight away whether someone has that certain something. Margarita Balanas has it.”

As Assistant Conductor, Margarita Balanas accompanies the rehearsals, compares what she hears with the score, notes technical and interpretative details and checks the sound balance as Paavo Järvi’s second pair of ears, so to speak. And she also conducts herself: Last season, she conducted the final concert of the family project “What do you think ocean?”. And in the 2024/25 season, she will conduct both the family join-in concert “Thorstein and the Giants” and the final concert of the new children’s project “Kunterwunderbunt”.

www.margaritabalanas.com

Born in Rome, Raffaello Morales has lived in London since 2009. He studied piano and composition in Italy, Austria and the UK and having graduated in 2009 in Physics and Piano Performance he completed postgraduate studies in Theoretical Physics and Applied Mathematics. After a five-year career in investment banking, he decided to dedicate himself entirely to music as a conductor, pianist, composer, producer and educator. He is the music director of Fidelio Orchestra, which he founded in 2019. in 2019, the Fidelio Orchestra has quickly established itself as a vibrant presence in London’s classical music scene. It brings together people with a shared commitment to making great music in an atmosphere that is both joyful and refreshingly unpretentious.

Run as a charity, the orchestra is dedicated to providing young musicians with high-quality orchestral experience and opportunities to collaborate with exceptional soloists.

By including non-professional players alongside emerging professionals, the Fidelio Orchestra fosters a space where performing historical repertoire is not only a professional pursuit, but also a powerful way to connect the world of classical music with broader society.

Angela Hewitt plays Bach and Brahms with the Fidelio Orchestra of Raffaello Morales

Diabelli is box office at Fidelio where Genius meets Genius -Filippo Gorini and Raffaello Morales breaking barriers

A remarkable Wigmore debut for Daniel Lebhardt where an artist is known by his programmes and this is one of the most remarkably original that I have seen since Arrau. Starting and finishing with the two Saint Francis legends twinned with two rarely heard late pieces also by Liszt. In between there was the fantasmagorical world of Schumann driven to madness by his genius that like Liszt could foresee a new world opening up. Firstly Kreisleriana from Schumann’s youthful outpouring of pianistic masterpieces from op 1 to op 23. After the interval two of Schumann’s last piano works with his Songs of Dawn and the Ghost variations. Separating them was a work by Schumann’s wife, Clara with a set of variations on her husband’s Bunte Blatter op 99, the same theme that Brahms was to use for his Schumann Variations op 9 and that Schumann had said had been sent to him by the Angels .

Liszt’s setting of a French folk song that seems to foresee what direction Liszt’s prophetic genius was to take him . And finally the legend of St Francis walking on the waves .

An eclectic programme played with mastery and an extraordinary range of sounds, from barely whispered to the roar of a Lion . Daniel raised in the unmistakable Hungarian school of glowing fluidity and sumptuous liquid sounds . Even in the most strenuous passages there was never a hard sound but a clarity and cleanliness that is so much to be admired by pianists such as Geza Anda or Tamas Vasary. An intelligent musicianship and a relaxed ease of execution that denied any hard or ungrateful sounds . Although Daniel has graduated from the class of Pascal Nemirowski at the Birmingham Conservatoire his heritage is his birthright .

Masterly playing that held us in his spell for a long and difficult programme . Quite rightly greeted with cheers from a very attentive audience who realised that here was a star shining brightly.

Brahms A major Intermezzo op 118 n. 2 was a very special thank you that Daniel offered to his very enthusiastic audience.

It was here that the heavens truly opened as Daniel recounted this wonderful story with poetic artistry and a palette of sounds that were both orchestral and pianistic, in fact the unique sound world of Brahms brought to life with vibrant beauty and poetic intensity..

Daniel Lebhardt A complete artist descends on St Mary’s with simplicity and grandeur

Daniel Lebhardt Emperor for the night

Daniel Lebhardt ‘The Prince of Piano’ descends on St Mary’s

Daniel Lebhardt the simple grandeur of J.S.Bach at St Mary’s

It was good to be back at the Bechstein Hall and be greeted by a full house for a master pianist.

Many distinguished musicians present including Patsy Fou the widow of Fou Ts’ong who had been the inspiration for generations of musicians including François Dumont .

Dame Imogen Cooper with some delightful American guests including the bronze medal winner of this years Cliburn. He was in London to delve even deeper into his musical understanding as Dame Imogen had done for a lifetime with the late Alfred Brendel. Charming American guests who said were fans of mine!!!!

It was a real treat to be greeted with smiles by Terry Lewis, that indefatigable friend to all pianists great and small . A hall that he had idealised and has not had an easy gestation. Today there was an air of expectation and excitement for a pianist who is a real musician with a capital M. He had chosen Bechstein Hall for his CD launch because Debussy had declared that great music should only be composed for the Bechstein !

Francois turned these early works into gems and combined them with popular works by Chopin the only composer that Debussy could never criticise and had infact edited his complete works.

The Chopin nocturne op posth, I remember Fou Ts’ong searching for the original manuscript to understand the cross rhythm of the central section. François remembers that too, from the masterclasses he had regularly at the International Piano Academy Lake Como, where Ts’ong for over ten years would love to go and share his thoughts with master pianists of the younger generation. There was a ravishing beauty and masterly control of the pedal with a sense of balance that allowed the beautiful bel canto to sing so naturally, with embellishments that just unfolded in the same natural way as a singer. It was the same with the D flat Nocturne op 27, which is surely one of the most beautiful bel canto melodies ever to evolve from Chopin’s hands. Beauty but also passion as this was not the timid effeminate Chopin of his aristocratic lady pupils, but a great drama that was opening up with the assertive questions and delicate replies.The triumphant return of the melody ( so similar to the B minor Sonata) dissolved into an outpouring of gossamer streams of gold that were played with extraordinary authority. Fingers like limpets that,were attracted to the very heart of each note. It reminded me of Rosalyn Tureck’s reply when she simply stated that she did not play wrong notes, because every note has a meaning, and is part of a musical conversation and architectural shape where individual note picking is just not part of her conception of music. With François too ,one felt that everything he did was part of a larger design of authority and poetic reasoning. There was a wondrous sense of colour to Debussy with layers of sound created by a masterly use of the pedals that allowed for extraordinary clarity. Claire de lune was played at a flowing tempo that allowed for a sense of line and emotional impact that led so naturally into the beautiful flowing central episode. François is a master of sound who can create such character with a kaleidoscopic palette of sounds and an impish sense of humour as in the ‘Passepied’.A sense of characterisation that brought the set of six pieces written for his beloved Chouchou vividly to life . The grandiose opening of the Prélude just dissolving into a mellifluous outpouring and a Menuet with its wondrous sounds that appear like the sun coming out as passion ignites the romantic atmosphere. The Chopin G flat Impromptu and Third Ballade were played with aristocratic good taste and rich harmonic sounds.The two nocturnes op 48 were played with noble authority and passionate conviction just as the two Impromptus were played with beguiling jeux perlé and enticing rubato. The Fourth Ballade was given a monumental performance where the music unfolded in a continuous outpouring ever more intense until the final explosion of glorious beauty. A coda often played as a technical exercise was in François hands an outpouring of romantic fervour of exhilaration and excitement.

‘La plus que lente’ – the last piece on his CD was his choice of encore and was played with whispered insinuating sounds of sumptuous beauty.

Not expecting such an ovation he returned to play Chopin’s Berceuse where the minutes of silence after the final chord was evidence of the spell that François had created with his music making and great artistry

Programme  

CHOPIN: Nocturne in C-sharp minor, Op. posth. 

CHOPIN: Nocturne in D-flat major, Op. 27 No. 2 

DEBUSSY: Suite Bergamasque 

Prélude 

Menuet 

Clair de Lune 

Passepied 

CHOPIN: Impromptu No. 3 in G-flat major, Op. 51 

CHOPIN: Ballade No. 3 in A-flat major, Op. 47 

Intermission 30 min 

DEBUSSY: Children’s Corner 

Doctor Gradus ad Parnassum 

Jimbo’s Lullaby 

Serenade for the Doll 

The Snow Is Dancing 

The Little Shepherd 

Golliwog’s Cake-Walk 

CHOPIN: Impromptu No. 1 in A-flat major, Op. 29 

CHOPIN: Two Nocturnes, Op. 48 

CHOPIN: Ballade No. 4 in F minor, Op. 52

Francois Dumont remembering the genius of Fou Ts’ong at the Razumovsky Academy

‘Parting is such sweet sorry so we will say adieu until the morrow.’
Víctor Braojos pays Homage to Alicia de Larrocha at the Matthiesen Gallery.

Adieu to the piano in storage at the gallery on loan from the Imogen Cooper Music Trust where Mary Orr courageously has continued the Young Artists Series . There may be no more piano concerts but there are many magnificent ensembles awaiting to play in such sumptuous surrounds in the heart of Mayfair.

Victor playing with such sumptuous beauty and intelligent musicianship that his homage was doubly significant. ‘Sins of Youth’ might be the title of compositions written by the great pianist between the age of 7 and 30 but when played so persuasively I look forward to hearing more of her ‘sinning’ past .

Alicia the great pianist we all know and loved for her humility, integrity and reverence for music with a capital M. She was the simplest most lovely of people off stage, but in front of the piano she was totally dedicated to serving the composer to the best of her ability.

From the school of Frank Marshall a remarkable pianist from the turn of the last century, who had created his own Academy of which Alicia later in life became director.

Victor had chosen works with which she was mostly associated.
Beginning with ‘Estampes’ that he played with the same simplicity and kaleidoscopic palette of colour as I imagine Alicia would have used. ‘Pagodes’ of radiant beauty and a wondrous sense of balance in which the musical line was inextricably entwined in a magic web of sounds with notes that were merely vibrations of extraordinary golden mastery. ’La Soirée dans Grenade’ was full of mystery and beauty added to a nostalgia and a memory of past experience. What ravishment there was with the tenor melody accompanied by the beguiling dance rhythms glistening above such decadence. Victor’s rain drops were of the same crystalline purity that I remember was so much part of Alicia’s playing . Gradually building in intensity until the purity of a child’s song appears in its midst as if by magic.

Alicia’s sin was called ‘Spring Song’ which Victor played with simple beauty with its rhapsodic mellifluous unfolding. There was the same simplicity and beauty to the ‘Maiden and the Nightingale’ that brought back memories of standing in the wings where I could appreciate the simple purity of her playing.The purity and simplicity of Granados’s Nightingale was certainly not the same one as in Berkeley Square! The Ballade of Love and Death is a tone poem of whispered profundity of deep contemplation and played by Victor with extraordinary poignancy and deeply felt concentration .

I cannot recall Alicia playing much Chopin but Schumann I could never forget . And neither could I forget the Schumannesque encore that Victor repeated today .The ‘Epilogo’ from Granados Romantic Scenes.

As Victor said maybe the Chopin Fantaisie was not in Alicia’s programmes but I am sure I had heard her play it together with the Fourth Ballade . I can imagine her supreme musicianship and remarkable technical mastery giving strength to the two Chopin Sonatas and will search for her recordings inspired by this Homage to one of the great pianist of our age. Victor’s performance of the Fantasie restored an often maligned masterpiece to the pinnacle that it surely deserves.

I have heard Victor many times over the past six years when he had been studying in a London with Martin Roscoe at the Guildhall
A talented student transformed into the great artist we heard tonight, on the wings of his revered Spanish idol, Alicia de Larrocha

Victor Braojos at Imperial College ‘The voice of Spain with love,authority and passion’

Victor Braojos at St Mary’s The intelligence and aristocratic authority of a true musician

Alicia de Larrocha, Composer

Jed Distler

Yes, it’s the same Alicia de Larrocha. Few knew that the 20th century’s foremost Spanish pianist wrote music. She started composing at age seven and continued on and off until her 30th year, with a prolific spurt in her late teens. Admittedly, she composed for her own private pleasure, mostly for family and friends, and not for public performance. While the pianist played down her creative efforts as sins of her youth, she didn’t entirely disown them, and allowed her family to decide whether or not to make these works available after her death.

The majority of pieces are solo-piano miniatures, along with eight songs, a Romance for Cello and Piano, and a three-movement Violin Sonata. Although the music’s ambitions are modest, every piece communicates charm and sincerity, not to mention Larrocha’s command of keyboard texture and excellent harmonic sense influenced in part by early- to mid-20th century Spanish piano music by Turina, Mompou, and Nin. Listen to Aiguablava’s disarming melodies and sophisticated manipulation of registral extremes, or to Burlesca’s rhythmic snap and suave chromatic sleights-of-hand, and you’ll understand what I mean.

Ten Inventions and a four-movement Suite from 1939, plus the 1941 Sonata antigua add up to delightful faux Scarlatti. Sandwiched between the Violin Sonata’s two bland outer movements is a gorgeous Adagio packed with harmonic intensity. It’s let down, however, by violinist Ala Voronkova’s ugly tone and wobbly vibrato. It’s the complete opposite of cellist Peter Schmidt’s elegance and control in the little Schumannesque Romanza. Marta Zabaleta does an admirable job with the solo piano selections, especially in slower, lyrical works. However, faster virtuosic fare would have benefited from more lightness and élan on the level of a pianist like…hmmm…let me see…Alicia de Larrocha.

For me, the songs represent Larrocha’s strongest compositions. I love the folksy tunefulness and neo-Gershwin chords in Canço d’un doble amor and Maite, and admire how the rippling extroversion of Hoy creo en Dios never becomes cloying. Inspiration flows freest when Larrocha lets her dark and brooding side emerge in the desolate Tal vida tal fin, and in Mi vida es un erial, where soprano Marta Mathéu gorgeously floats the long lines as if she never needs breath. Her lovingly characterized performances further stand out by virtue of Albert Guinovart’s world-class accompaniments. Indeed, Guinovart ought to have been recruited for some of the solo pieces; he’s an underrated artist whose terrific Harmonia Mundi solo CDs deserve serious attention.

The booklet notes couldn’t be more informative, and there are full texts and translations for the songs. Had the performances been uniformly consistent, I’d be able to recommend this release without qualification. At the very least, it’s worth it for the songs.

Recording Details:

Album Title: Pecados de Juventud
Reference Recording: None for this collection

• LARROCHA, ALICIA DE:
  Chamber & Piano works

• Record Label: Columna Musica – 001
• Medium: CD

Frank Marshall King (November 28, 1883 – May 29, 1959), was a Spanish Catalan pianist and pedagogue born to parents of English heritage.

Marshall was born in Mataró, Catalonia, Spain . He attended the Conservatori Superior de Musica del Liceu and then began studying with Enrique Granados . Marshall and Granados became close musical associates, and Marshall became Granados’s teaching assistant at the latter’s academy.

When Granados died in 1916, Marshall became its director; he remained director until his death in 1959, and the institute’s name was eventually changed to Académia Frank Marshall. Its administrators and faculty included Alicia de Larrocha and Mercedes Roldós Freixes. Among his pupils at the school was the composer Vincente Asencio. He published two pedagogic works, Estudio práctico sobre los pedales del piano(Madrid, 1919) and La sonoridad del piano, which attempted to notate piano pedalling  more precisely.

Marshall’s influence as a pianist and teacher impacted Catalan piano playing heavily; his approaches to pedaling and voicing helped refine the distinctive style of piano playing from the region. No. 3 of Federico Mompou’s Cancons I Danses  was dedicated to him. His students included Alicia de Larrocha, Mercedes Roldós Freixes, and the Catalan pianist Albert Attenelle, who premiered Mompou’s Chopin Variations.

Marshall died in Barcelona  in 1959, aged 75.

There is only one other person who used to regularly finish his marathon programmes with the Polonaise Héroique when he was well into his 80’s. Martha at 84 showed us that they don’t make them like she and Rubinstein any more.

A programme that would have struck fear into a pianist half her age. With Chopin’s monstrously unpianistic ‘Allegro de Concert’ and Ginastera’s explosive first sonata. Including also Mozart’s Duport variations of punctilious fingerfertigkeit , so exposed but with such delectable style.

Sumptuous almost decadent Debussy with his Suite Bergamasque played with expansive improvised freedom.
A first encore of a Guastavino dance,Bailecito, and finally the explosion of dynamic drive and sumptuous rich sounds of Chopin’s Polonaise.

What a marvel for the opening concert of the Festival of Nations at the Tempietto in the centre of Rome. In collaborazione with Prof Ricci’s Centro Musicale Internazionale ( Francesco Siciliani ) that filled this unique courtyard surrounded by the grandeur of Il Tempio di Marcello and attached to the most beautiful baroque church in Rome.

Martha very generously sharing her music with the birds who were obviously happy to find a fellow musician in their midst . More used to police sirens and helicopters that seem to be de rigeur in all the major cities these days. Mozart variations played with a crystalline clarity of purity and childlike simplicity. Appearances can he deceptive as Schnabel was to point out with his much quoted remark about Mozart being too easy for children but too difficult for adults. This veteran pianist was able to play with a refreshing sense of improvisation as indeed must have been the case at their birth. Extraordinary precision and depth of sound allowed her to play with very sparing use of the pedal that gave a sparkling jewel like feel to the mischievous meanderings that Mozart would have improvised much to the amazement of his contemporaries.

There is truly glorious melodic invention to what may well have been the first movement of Chopin’s intended Third Piano Concerto. It was wonderful to hear the majestic nobility and touching bel canto pour from Martha’s hands with the same aristocratic nobility that was Arrau’s. Rarely played in the concert hall probably because of the stamina and technical mastery required for music that is often more orchestral than pianistic. After the opening sumptuous tutti there was a lone voice high in the keyboard as the soloist was about to make her appearance. Ravishing beauty and a beguiling freedom of exquisite good taste allowed Chopin’s poetic web of bel canto to ring out much to the joy of the birds in the giant pine that sits so regally in this historic garden.A glorious ending of nobility and sumptuous virtuosity brought this one movement work to a triumphant end.

A short break for a piece of chocolate and a glass of water that was waiting for her at the back of the courtyard .

Her long time colleague Hector Pell was holding fort, amazed as we all were, by Martha’s stamina and infectious enjoyment of sharing her music with us all : public, birds, sirens, helicopter and even Gus the theatre cat. ( I often in exasperation describe the Eternal city as the Infernal city )

Another work all to rarely heard these days, is Debussy’s early Suite Bergamasque. A suite of four pieces of evocative and insinuating beauty. This too was played with an air of expansive improvised freedom. From the nobility of the opening Prélude with its grandiose flourishes and a Menuet of capricious beauty expanding to a wondrous pulsating melody of romantic outpouring. Clair de lune was the ideal work for this balmy night in Rome. Magic sounds glowed with subtle inflections of palpitating emotions, with the central episode a wave of sounds on which Debussy places one of his most enticing melodies with inner counterpoints just hinted at with the refined artistry where things are suggested rather than stated. A masterly use of the pedal allowed Martha to float sounds into this balmy air with the magic of the ‘feux follets’ that were attracted to such a magically illuminated scene. ‘Passepied’ was played with an impish sense of fun and character which underlined her masterly use of touch and palette of colour that had brought this suite vividly to life -A Midsummer Nights Dream indeed !

Last year Martha surprised us with a ‘Hammerklavier’ Sonata of dynamic strength and intellectual understanding .This year she astonished us with the call to arms and breathtaking physicality of Ginastera’s Sonata n 1 op 22. Prokofiev had written his three ‘War ‘ Sonatas too during the war years ,with the conviction and percussive barbarity mingled with deeply contemplative reflections of heart rending poignancy. Martha had studied this work of Ginastera with the composer and is a work so similar in many ways to Prokofiev.Martha’s performance was obviously definitive with the composer‘s voice speaking through Martha’s masterly hands.

A call to arms of dynamic drive and insistent animalistic cries took many by surprise, as our ‘Signora’ of the keyboard proceeded to pound the very life out of the keys with a percussive brilliance that would have had Stravinsky applauding and Rubinstein sobbing! But Ginastera has a secret up his sleeve with a ‘Presto misterioso’ of whispered murmurings. The hands playing in unison, reminiscent of the last movement of Chopin’s Funeral March Sonata, that has been likened to the wind blowing over the graves. Martha played with a remarkable whispered spidery legato that almost caught her out for a second, but a momentary lapse of concentration was a wake up call to what was a ‘tour de force’ of transcendental playing. There was a languid beauty to the Adagio expanding to passionate outbursts and the shrieks of horror from Ginastera’s tormented soul.The naked barbarism of the ruvido ed ostinato was of passionate dramatic effect.

Not expecting such an overwhelming success Martha had to rack her brain to think of a suitable encore to offer as a thank you to Prof Ricci and his faithful followers, who had invited her to play for them. An insinuating little dance by Guastavino was the ideal antidote to a Ginastera of such overwhelming potency.
Martha was enjoying herself and with a twinkle in her eye announced she would now end with Chopin’s Polonaise Héroique.The same energy and noble drive that I remember from many of Rubinstein’s recitals where life truly began at 80!

Martha Noguera in Rome and Sorrento ‘The authority and passionate conviction of a great artist.’

Homage to Lya De Barberiis Martha Noguera al Ghione

‘Kenny offered the audience, who filled the Steinway concert room to capacity, a very attractive programme, starting with the gem that is Bach’s Prelude No 10 in E minor arranged – and transposed to B minor – by Russian pianist, conductor and composer Alexander Siloti. Kenny Fu gave a tasteful account of the piece, although to me it wasn’t clear Kenny understood ‘why’ Bach’s left hand became Siloti’s right hand.

Haydn E minor Sonata was technically excellent and the Adagio had that feeing of improvisation, though the Presto and Vivace molto could have benefited for some of the wit and humour of the recently departed Alfred Brendel. 

The first Transcendental Etude by Liszt, in G minor was delivered with all the virtuosity required, but the fully-opened magnificent Steinway Model D was too loud for the room. Finger virtuosity is a gift that comes naturally to Kenny ; he now needs to refine his ”ear’ virtuosity, that is, listen to the balance of the voices in the music. Liszt’s 104 Soneto del Petrarca was expressed eloquently but will in time gain the intimacy it calls for.

Kenny Fu is a natural Chopin player and the selection of Masterpieces he offered proved that. My personal view is that the left hand in the ‘Revolutionary’ Etude, Op.10 No.12 ought to be more turbulent and dramatic and the right hand octaves and chords should add ‘colour’ to the left hand. And the ‘accelerando’ also has a meaning.The second Scherzo had drama and suspense. I’d suggest that Kenny takes heed of the fact that the desperate cry is in the 6th bar chord, not on the B flat of the preceding bar, which is a mere upbeat to the chord.  An exquisite Mazurka in C minor, Op 56 No.3, preceded the final Andante Spianato et Grande Polonaise Op.22, played with authority and conviction.’

Alberto Portugheis    

https://hufud.org/. 

https://albertoportugheis.com/opusmusica/. https://www.facebook.com/alberto.portugheis

From his early solo debut at the Wigmore Hall to his attainment of the prestigious Sir Elton John Scholarship, Kenny Fu holds much potential and promise for a bright future.He has given concerts on three continents and has already performed extensively throughout UK’s distinguished halls including St Martin-in-the-Fields, Kings Place, Worthing’s Assembly Hall, St James’s Sussex Gardens. He regularly appears in London, Oxford, Brighton and the South of England for more private concert engagements. His repertoire choices gravitate toward the late Classical and Romantic Eras where he brings an intense and captivating temperament to the works of Beethoven, Brahms and Rachmaninov. Recently, Kenny has been awarded First Prize at the Norah Sande International Awards, Second Prize in the Croatian Piano Loop Competition and Third prize at the Fifth Vigo International Piano Competition where Martha Argerich, Nelson Freire and Cyprien Katsaris were on the panel of judges.During his earlier years, he was the winner of the Solihull Young Musician of the Year, Silver medalist at the Cyprus International Piano Competition, semi finalist at the Sussex International Piano competition and a quarter finalist at the BBC young musician of the year.He has received guidance from numerous esteemed musicians such as Dimitri Alexeev, Evgeny Sudbin, Natalia Trull, Pascal Devoyon, Richard Goode, Tim Horton, Imogen Cooper and Angela Hewitt during his studies at the Purcell School of Music and the Royal Academy of Music.Kenny was born in Leamington Spa and is currently in the Advanced Diploma program at the Royal Academy of Music under the tutelage of Prof. Tatiana Sarkissova and Ian Fountain. He is generously sponsored by the Countess of Munster Trust, Warwick Arts Fund and Talent Unlimited.Another superb concert presented at Steinway Hall by the unique Keyboard Charitable Trust. This time it was the turn of a remarkable young pianist KENNY FU, born in the UK, to Chinese parents. 

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

Kenny Fu at St James’s Lancaster Gate ‘clarity and intelligence of refined brilliance’

 

Masterly playing of great authority and aristocratic good taste. A curious opening, though, with the deep bass D flat of the nocturne op 27 n. 2 played by the right hand ! Luckily it was the only eccentricity in a recital where it would have been hard to change a single note. The nocturne is one of Chopin’s most beautiful Bel Canto melodies and Michal played it with restrained elegance ,where everything was given time to sing with timeless beauty. Some very discreet ornamentation where it might have been better to leave Chopin’s notes,like Mozart, with the purity of an instrument that can sustain without the need of added notes to fill up the lack of resonance! Ravishing playing that could have flowed more naturally but where every note was a jewel to be savoured.

The Scherzo in B flat minor was played with great authority where even the central chorale was played with weight .It unfolded with streams of wondrous sounds that were played with great control and ravishing beauty.There were slight hesitations and expressive punctuations that added such meaning and poignancy to this often distorted work. Exhilaration and excitement at the end of a work restored to the pedestal that it possessed from the hands of Artur Rubinstein. It was ,in fact, the final work in his last recital in 1976 when he had to abandon it, as almost blind he could no longer negotiate the treacherous skips, as he had in a career that had spanned over sixty years.His generosity at the age of ninety saved the Wigmore Hall from the greedy hands of the developers.

There was a leisurely opening to the F sharp Impromptu and a languid beauty to the melodic line that grew imperceptibly in nobility and sonority before bursting into a brilliant jeux perlé. Masterly playing as the streams of notes accompanied the melodic line with limpet like insistence as it disappeared into the distance with the opening chant returning like a dream of distant bells before the gloriously sonorous final chords.

The F sharp minor Polonaise just grew out of this window that had been opened. Wonderful solid playing that I remember too from Rubinstein and Askenase,with fingers like limpets digging deep into the keys and extracting golden sounds of passionate authority. Sounds that were from within the notes themselves played with aristocratic nobility. Extraordinary rhythmic precision as the central mazurka flowered into a melodic episode of nostalgic beauty.

The C sharp minor prelude op 45 is always a wonder to behold with its meandering changes of harmony magically spread across the entire keyboard. Michal played them with a wondrous sense of discovery with the final cadenza of moving harmonies arriving so naturally to the opening deep C sharp octave of the Barcarolle.

One of Chopin’s last and most perfect creations ,the Barcarolle is a great song from beginning to end , of timeless beauty, as the gentle lapping forward movement is a wave on which Chopin could carve out some of his most heavenly melodic creations. There was a deep yearning to the final pages as the music expanded in an explosion of beauty. The final cascade of notes with the gentle rocking theme barely suggested in the left hand was the example that Ravel was to follow and to add to his own magic sound world a century later.

After the Venetian Lagoon what better than a work by a Polish composer Rózycki with the name ‘Lagune’. A romantic tone poem of flowing beauty and sumptuous sounds of passionate persuasion.It was played with great conviction and was a very interesting addition to a programme of well known classics and a good bridge between the Genius of Chopin and the Genius of Debussy. A refreshing intermezzo played brilliantly with a kaleidoscope of colour of romantic exuberance.

Wonderfully atmospheric Debussy’s’ Sunken Cathedral’ ,and very interesting to note that Michal was using the middle pedal that gave great clarity to the chordal sounds out of which the Cathedral emerges. Wonderful deep gong sounds in the bass played with great authority as the bells ring out and the Cathedral disappears into the mist with the plaintive chant of evocative beauty reduced to a wondrous glowing whisper.

What a change of character with Minstrels with it’s chameleonic changes and capricious uncontrolled exuberance. It was immediately transformed into the refreshing simplicity of Chopin’s ‘Maidens Wish’ in Liszt’s authoritative transcription.

A work that used to be a regular encore for pianists of the Golden Age of piano playing, in particular Moritz Rosenthal but also Claudio Arrau. A much neglected jewel that was played with wondrous beguiling mastery by Michal.
What a treat to hear Paderewski’s once much loved Minuet in G played with the same mastery as the great master, who was considered to be the greatest pianist of his day and would have played this piece as an encore on his famous tournées in America

A Polish pianist and conductor, Michal Szymanowski was born in 1988 into a musical family. He graduated with honours from the Feliks Nowowiejski Academy of Music in Bydgoszcz, where he studied piano with Katarzyna Popowa-Zydron and symphonic and opera conducting under Zygmunt Rychert. He honed his skills with Eldar Nebolsin at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler Berlin. At present he works as an assistant lecturer at his alma mater. He has won top awards in a number of national and international music competitions, including Darmstadt International Chopin Piano Competition (2017), MozARTe International Piano Competition Aachen (2016), Asia-Pacific International Chopin Competition in Daegu (2015), International Juliusz Zarebski Music Competition in Warsaw (2012), Yamaha Music Foundation of Europe in Katowice (2011), International Paderewski Piano Competition in Bydgoszcz (2010), International Competition for Young Pianists in Memory of Vladimir Horowitz (2007). In 2015 he was the highest placed quarter-finalist in the International Fryderyk Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw. 

Michal Szymanowski has performed in many concerts across Europe and throughout the world, including the Palace of Nations, the Paul VI Audience Hall, Belvedere Palace, numerous philharmonic halls as well as major festivals in Poland and abroad, among them Oficina de Música de Curitiba, Chopiniana in Buenos Aires, Festival Europeo de Jóvenes Solistas in Caracas, Festival Pianistico di Roma, LongLake Festival Lugano, and the Chopin and his Europe Festival in Warsaw, where he brilliantly performed piano concertos by Paderewski, Wieniawski and Stojowski. Apart from solo repertoire, he also frequently performs chamber music. He has released two solo albums featuring compositions by Chopin, Paderewski, Szymanowski and Wieniawski. The recordings were critically acclaimed.

Chopin alive and well at St Mary’s in the masterly hands of Michal Szymanowski.The aristocratic simplicity of a great artist

 

A quite monumental performance of the Liszt Sonata from Dmitri with his guns blowing fast and furious. But also with intelligence and aristocratic poetic playing of nobility and extraordinary clarity. The torrid heat may have lead to a moment’s lack of concentration but Dmitri’s masterly understanding brushed all aside as he filled this little redundant church with orchestral sounds that it has rarely heard before.

Opening with Bach Fantasia and fugue in C minor of utmost clarity and exemplary intelligence. A fluidity and great rhythmic impulse with a grandiose opening flourish leading to a knotty twine of exemplary precision. A fugue of whispered meanderings but where every strand was a voice of its own uniting to create another monumental fugue from the pen of the genius of Köthen.

Brahms mighty Handel variations were given a ‘short back and sides’ performance of total mastery, but I missed the sumptuous orchestral sounds and total commitment that he was to reserve for his quite extraordinary performance of Liszt. Lacking the orchestral weight this was a performance of quite extraordinary mastery from a musician who had seen the work more in pianistic than orchestral terms. It is indeed a ‘tour de force’ of varying technical problems and is often given to advanced students together with the Schubert Wanderer Fantasy to show how technical and musical problems can be shared and mastered together.

The opening theme from Handel’s Suite n. 1 in B flat HWV 434 was allowed to unfold with refined elegance and perfectly balanced ornaments.The first variation beautifully phrased with gently underlined bass notes just highlighting the whirlwind cadence. Contrasting with the gentle meandering of the second where Dmitri highlighted inner voices to great effect. A deliberate lilt to the third was played with great character before bursting into flames with the brilliant octaves of the fourth.Played with a lightness that allowed Dmitri to shape the phrases with musical imagination. A beguiling flow to the beautiful melodic outpouring of the fifth and the legato octaves shadowing each other of the sixth. A call to arms with the strident seventh which ignited the impetuous rhythmic elan of the eighth.A great rhetorical cry to the ninth as each gasp reached ever higher .What fun Dmitri had chasing up and down the keyboard in a cat and mouse game of demonic energy. A beautiful contrast of radiance from the eleventh and twelfth was played with a glowing beauty.

The great majestic thirteenth was beautifully shaped but I feel it just lacked that sumptuous richness that he was to save for Liszt .The fourteenth and fifteenth just flew from his fingers with mastery and dynamic drive before the lightweight meanderings of the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth. There was a delightfully refreshing interlude with Brahms’s Siciliana that had been inspired by Couperin ( Brahms had edited Couperin’s music). Followed by a radiance to the music box variation of the twenty second before the dynamic build up of dramatic tension leading to the final exultant twenty-fifth. A final variation where I missed the sumptuous orchestral nobility which Dmitri preferred to play with exemplary taught rhythms of great clarity missing the glorious point of arrival of the twenty four previous variations. A contrast too, to the simple opening of the fugue where Dmitri did now open up to a finale of astonishing nobility and grandeur born on the wings of Handel’s innocuous B flat theme.

I bow to the choice of a master musician but also one that can dispatch Brahms’s ingenious variations with such musicianship of clarity and precision.

The Liszt Sonata seemed to unleash in Dmitri a demonic mastery and poetic freedom that had been kept under control in the Bach and Brahms. A dramatic opening where the three main characters are presented as a great story about to unfold. Sumptuous full sounds and passionate commitment were contrasted with a kaleidoscopic rich palette of colours .A sense of balance where Liszt’s seemingly overpowering chordal accompaniments were a heart beating fast, but allowing the melodic line to sing out in its midst with quite extraordinary intensity. Dmitri had a whole orchestra in his hands but not sacrificing his enviable technical mastery and clarity. The final octaves I have never heard played with such mastery or intensity. A slow movement that was of heartrending aristocratic poise as sounds were barely whispered with extraordinary innermost meaning. A monumental performance marred only by a moment of distraction towards the end where the temperature must have been reaching boiling point in every sense of the word.

Dmitrii Kalashnikov began postgraduate studies at the Royal College of Music, London, in 2018, in the class of Professor Vanessa Latarche as a Ruth West Scholar, supported by the Neville Wathen Scholarship, and more recently as a Blüthner Pianos scholar. His earlier studies began at the age of five at the Moscow secondary special music school named after Gnessin, in the classes of Ada Traub and Tatyana Vorobieva. In 2017, he graduated with honours from the Moscow State Conservatory P I Tchaikovsky, where he was taught by Professor Elena Kuznetsova. His prizes have included the Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother Rosebowl at the RCM, awarded to a student of distinction, the winner of the 2019 final of the Jacques Samuel Intercollegiate Piano Competition (London), and, in the same year, the first prize at Les Etoiles Du Piano International Piano Competition (France). In 2021, he won first prize in the Junior Intercollegiate Piano Competition (Beethoven Piano Society of Europe). 

Dmitrii performs regularly with the Russian National Orchestra under the direction of Mikhail Pletnev. In December 2014, Mikhail Pletnev and Dmitrii Kalashnikov gave a two-piano recital in the Great Hall of the Moscow State Conservatory. He graduated from the Royal College of Music in 2021 with distinction, and the University of Music and Performing Arts (Vienna) in 2022, under the guidance of Professor Anna Malikova. In July, he participated in the Lille’s piano festival in Louvre 2 (France), and a concert in the Wigmore Hall, London. Additionally, he had performances in the USA in 2022. More recently, in May 2022, he played the accompanying concert in the presence of HRH Prince Charles, now HM King Charles III, following the annual awards ceremony at the Royal College of Music in London.

Dmitri Kalashnikov at Bechstein Hall ‘Canons covered in Flowers’ of poetic mastery

Simone Tavoni in the church where Sigismund Thalberg was married to Francesca Lablache in July 1843. https://christopheraxworthymusiccommentary.com/2020/01/04/a-la-recherche-de-thalberg/

St James’s Piccadilly just a stones throw from the Circus and the statue of Eros.

An oasis of peace in its own grounds slightly set back from the hustle and bustle all around. Simone Tavoni giving a lunchtime recital for the Talent Unlimited organisation of Canan Maxton.

Mendelssohn, the favourite at the court of Queen Victoria, opened the concert with his ‘Variations Sérieuses’ and the Nocturne from ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ in the arrangement by Moszkowski. There was a continual forward movement to the Variations following the theme that Simone played with subtle delicacy and exquisite phrasing. Variations propelled forward by an inner force of a dynamic drive of ease and extraordinary invention. A coda that just exploded with energy and scintillating brilliance before dying to a mere whisper.

It was on this peaceful note that the beauty of the Midsummer Nocturne was allowed to unfold with beguiling natural beauty.

Three mazurkas by Chopin were played without a break and were a lesson in style and subtle flexibility where the dance was always present. Surrounded by the nostalgia that Chopin was to carry in his heart until at the age of only 39 when it was brought back to rest in his homeland where it truly always belonged. Schumann quite rightly described these 52 short tone poems as ‘canons covered in flowers’.

Rachmaninov’s Second sonata has become a concert favourite since Horowitz reminded us of it in his Indian Summer concerts in the 70’s and early 80’s. He had been persuaded to return to the concert platform to remind a distracted world that he was still the greatest pianist alive or dead!

Simone played the original 1931 version that Rachmaninov had sanctioned and decided to leave the souped up Horowitz version to the undisputed pianistic genius that Horowitz was until the very end.

It is a work that played as today by a true musician can stand on its own merits and not rely on just empty showmanship. Simone played with passion and brilliance but there was a beguiling subtle beauty to the slow movement before the exhilaration and excitement of the Allegro molto.

An ovation from a very attentive audience was rewarded with a glistening Mazurka that this time could well have been by Scriabin ?

Simone Tavoni in Perivale ‘A musician of poetic insight and curiosity’

Simone Tavoni at Livorno Classica flying high with poetic reasoning and with Dinosaurs overhead

Simone Tavoni triumphs on the Italian tour for the Keyboard Trust – part 1 Florence – part 2 Venice and Padua

Simone Tavoni a Poet speaks at the 1901Arts Club