After a day of Masterclasses with Federico Nicoletta one of the students was chosen to give an evening recital.

Filippo Odobashi, a sixteen year old student of Nicoletta, had presented the ‘Emperor’ concerto in the class and now just a few hours later he was ready to play works by Bach,Haydn, Schumann and Rachmaninov. A recital that belied his anagraphical age with playing of maturity, personality and technical mastery.

Bach’s Italian concerto was played with great clarity where a beautiful non legato touch was contrasted with a mellifluous legato, contrasting the solo with the concertante . A dynamic drive but with a refined sense of colour and dynamic contrasts. An aristocratic nobility but with a musical personality where freedom intelligence and style could combine to beguiling effect.

An opaque lifeless left hand in the Andante was the base on which Filippo floated a melodic line of radiance and poignant significance. Giving an architectural shape to this Gothic cathedral of monumental solidity and beauty.

The Presto just shot from Filippo’s well oiled fingers but was given always an extraordinary shape with contrasting dynamics whilst with a hypnotic forward propulsion.

Haydn’s two movement sonata in G was allowed to unravel with playful innocence. A sense of style but a rather dry opening that as he gradually found his way he was able to add his personal voice with a palette of colours and teasing rubato. A coda of startling originality that he played with a great sense of character. Haydn’s chattering Presto was with a playful frenzy and a ‘joie de vivre’ of verve and masterly control.

I remember Richter on his first visit to the West opening his recital with Schumann’s op 1. It was a revelation for how he could float the opening melody on a wash of sound. It was a performance where bar lines just disappeared as he threw off the jeu perlé streams of notes with jewel like lightness.

Filippo gave a very accomplished performance but it was too earthbound as the theme seemed to be tied down rather than just floating in one ethereal arch. Technically it held no terror for Filippo who dispatched the brilliant variations with fearless mastery. But this is an early salon work they needs above all charm, grace and a wondrous sense of improvised fantasy. Even Richter missed the charm as the brilliance of the writing like Mendelssohn seemed to slip from his fingers with such well oiled mastery . Filippo showed us too with his encore of the first of Schumann’s Kreisleriana that if you take Schumann’s indications too literally it can seem too teutonic instead of poetic.

It was the world of Rachmaninov that ignited the passion and poetic intensity of this very talented young man. Just five preludes from op 23 were enough to show how Filippo’s extraordinary technical mastery was at the service of passionate outpourings of great intensity. A kaleidoscope of colours that ignited the torrid atmosphere of this beautiful antique auditorium.

The first played with a glowing radiance tinged with nostalgia. The imperious nobility of the second bursting onto the scene with sumptuous sounds and fearless technical mastery. An improvised character to the third was played with an extraordinary sense of character and multi coloured palette of sounds . The beauty of the melodic line of the fourth where the gossamer accompaniment of golden sounds wove their way around this beautiful rich melodic outpouring to sublime effect. The seventh was an outpouring of continuous notes on which Rachmaninov floats a magical chorale like melody . A rather strange rubato at the beginning was soon forgotten as the passion and sumptuous beauty brought the recital to a magnificent end .

Unfortunately not a big audience but it was a very appreciative one.

Boris Berman would quite simply have quipped ‘If they don’t want to come you cannot stop them ‘

A remarkable recital for a pianist of any age but as Filippo is only 16 it bodes well for his future performances guided by the remarkable Federico Nicoletta at Rovigo Conservatory invigorated by the presence of Nicoletta and his colleague Roberto Prosseda.