A Queen returns to Trapani to astonish and seduce with timeless mastery and ravishing beauty. Playing of aristocratic weight from a great artist who at 87 can still persuade us that the piano can sing with a voice of simplicity and touching humanity. Oxana Yablonskaya after a day listening to extraordinarily talented young musicians could at last sit before this black beast and allow wondrous stories to unfold from her fingers with the simplicity and mastery of an artist who has dedicated the whole of her long life to music.
She confided afterwards that the Chopin variations op 12, rarely heard in the concert hall, she had learnt when she was 10 ! Today the years just disappeared as the ten year old Oxana allowed Chopin’s music to unfold with the maturity and mastery of a living legend. Oxana like Argerich is able to make the music speak in a way that is always different. Slight infections, hesitations and an astonishing palette of sounds that can make the piano sing with a bel canto that would put even Caballé to shame. Oxana is part of an elite and unique group of octogenarian pianists who can demonstrate what it means to play with weight.
Argerich, Virsaladze, Leonskaya and Yablonskaya can seduce us as Rubinstein used to do in his Indian Summer, not with circus tricks but with the humility and lifetime mastery that can persuade us that this black box of hammers and strings can become an orchestra that is capable of roaring like a lion or seducing like a God. To watch Oxana and see the simple arch of her hands , so strong and noble like the columns of a Greek temple but at the same time so sensitive and sensibile . Je sens, je joue, je trasmet is what came vividly to mind as Oxana carved out the melodic line of Chopin’s first nocturne as Michangelo must have miraculously done with a slab of Carrara marble.
Beethoven’s Tempest Sonata not only played with scrupulous attention to the score but with crystalline clarity. The first notes where Beethoven’s contrast between mystery and mastery suddenly became clear as never before . The contrasts all through the sonata due to her mastery of the pedal was a true revelation . After the clouded recitativi suddenly Oxana produced menacing frighteningly whispered non legato chords that sent a shiver down the spine . An Adagio was grazioso but was also monumental as it disappeared with a whisper only to find that the Rondo was waiting to gently unfold before taking wing with aristocratic authority and at times music box fluidity.
A selection of Mendelssohn Songs without Words unfolded with the simplicity and magic that she had brought to Gluck’s sublime melodie from Orpheus that had opened the programme. Mendelssohn’s charm and grace like Griegs Lyric pieces are so rare to hear in concert these days where pianists like actors do not seem to have a diaphragm any more. A God given instrument that has been substituted for a microphone. Where an actor used to draw the audience in to his secret dream world rather than someone twiddling a mechanical knob off stage. The subtle art of acting has been substituted for media precision as the art of piano playing has been substituted for CD uniformity . The message that Oxana could share with us last night is a moment to cherish in a world where quantity has taken precedence over quality. After a long solo recital Oxana was glad to join us in the hall to celebrate the young musicians that she had been listening to for the past two days .
A competition that is bringing an important message to Trapani, a jewel in Sicily’s crown that Vincenzo and Giacometa Marrone D’Alberti want to share with a world starved of simplicity and beauty. Oxana now has a week of listening to artists competing for a place in the world of music that they have dedicated their their lives to. On Saturday she will fly to China where there is an explosion of culture and the average age of the public at classical concerts is a third of what it is in the west !
ChristopherAxworthy-MusicCommentary 