Some very fine playing from a pianist I have heard many times over the past years during his studies with Dmitri Alexeev at the R.C.M. A young man trained superbly from a very early age yet seemed to have lost his way in a period when every young person has to find his own direction and the path that he wants to follow. I had heard from my colleague Elena Vorotoko who was on the jury of the Sheepdrove competition in Newbury recently that Nikita had won first prize, as he had evidently now found the direction and reignited a passion for music that has always been deep inside him. Today I heard a young man with something to say and a means to say it with burning intensity and conviction. It was so refreshing to see how the physical movements related so beautifully with the sounds he was making – like a painter in front of his canvas . This was a programme that needs a master pianist to do it justice, with Ravel’s Gaspard de la Nuit written especially as a test for pianists. Followed by Prokofiev’s Seventh Sonata – the second of his trilogy of war sonatas – and where the last movement is a ‘Precipitato’ of relentless dynamic drive. In between was one of Liszt’s Paganini Studies , a true test for any pianist.
Of course with Bach nothing can be hidden and Nikita had nothing to fear as the clarity and precision of his playing was matched by his intellectual and musical understanding. Immediately we were struck by the beauty in the way he approaches the keys with playing of great clarity and a kaleidoscope of sounds . The absolute precision of the fugue was played with very little pedal but with a rhythmic drive of burning intensity. Nikita gave an architectural shape to the various episodes of this youthful Toccata that is bubbling over with ideas and abrupt contrasts as Bach delights in spontaneity and a sense of improvised invention.
Poor Ondine at the beginning was submerged in water but as Nikita entered into this magic world she appeared with a glowing beauty as the water was allowed to shimmer with sparkling brilliance all around her . A breathtaking climax was played with controlled passion and extraordinary mastery with glissandi that seemed so easy, even gliding over the black keys with his left hand fist. There were ravishing waves as Ondine disappeared into the distance under Nikitas sensitive hands. Le Gibet was played with chiselled beauty and purity with a tempo where the relentless tolling of the bell created the atmosphere of the desolate gallows swinging in the distance. Nikita played with a remarkable control of tempo and colouring as the demon Scarbo shot out of the dark. This movement was written by Ravel to out do the difficulty of Balakirev’s Islamey. It is notoriously difficult to maintain the tempo and burning intensity but at the same time play with clarity and a kaleidoscope of colours .Nikita gave a remarkable performance of burning intensity and dynamic drive.
It was the same mastery he brought to Paganini, but here there was not only extraordinary technical brilliance but also a charm and grace that can turn a study into a miniature tone poem.
It was ,though, Prokofiev that truly ignited Nikita’s imagination with a performance of striking contrasts and a kaleidoscope of colour and driving brilliance . The first movement was certainly ‘Inquieto’ with the jagged rhythms and pounding chords contrasting with the beauty of the Andantino. A slow movement that was indeed ‘Caloroso ‘with playing of great beauty and almost improvised freedom with its brooding repetitive menacing murmurs before the consoling beauty of the return of the main melody. The ‘Precipitato’ just shot from Nikita’s fingers with astonishing control .Never allowing the tension to sag and with ‘marcato’ injections of horror thrown in on a terrifying journey that explodes in the final bars and which Nikita played with fearless abandon .
Born into a family of musicians in Donetsk, Ukraine, pianist Nikita Burzanitsa began his musical training at the age of seven with Prof. Nataliya Chesnokova. He studied at the Special Music School for Gifted Children in Donetsk, where his talent quickly drew national attention through multiple first prizes in prestigious competitions, including the Horowitz Debut, Artobolevsky, and Per aspera ad astra.
In 2015, he received a full scholarship to Wells Cathedral School in the UK and subsequently continued his studies at the Royal College of Music in London. There, he completed his Bachelor of Music, Master of Performance, and Artist Diploma, studying under John Byrne and later Dmitri Alexeev. His studies were generously supported by awards and scholarships from the ABRSM, Piano Charitable Trust, Talent Unlimited, and the Drake Calleja Trust.
Nikita has performed extensively throughout Europe, including solo recitals and concerto appearances in the UK, France, Italy, Poland, Belgium, and Kazakhstan. He has played with leading orchestras under conductors such as Nikolay Dyadura, Vladimir Sirenko, and Natalia Ponomarchuk. He is a laureate of numerous competitions, including the BPSE Intercollegiate Piano Competition, the Jazeps Vitols International Piano Competition (Latvia),the Vienna Virtuoso Competition, and in 2025 the Sheepdrove Competition in Newbury
Misha Kaploukhii at St James’s Piccadilly with the stylistic beauty and refined brilliance of Clementi and the supreme fantasy world of Schumann’s magical Davidsbündler .
The crowning glory must go to Liszt’s monumental Norma Fantasy played with fearless abandon and breathtaking beauty. The wonderful thing about actually being in this beautiful church is for the acoustic where usually notey briliiance is transformed into streams of wonderful sounds . Here was a whole orchestra for Liszt’s operatic fantasy and a refined tonal palette for Clementi. Heartrending beauty for the initimate dream world of Eusebius and the impish good humour of Florestan.
I doubt that Schumann’s midnight chimes have even been struck so poignantly ‘ as quite superfluously Eusebius remarked as follows: but all the time great bliss spoke from his eyes.”
Opening with Clementi he made us all fall in love instantly with this much neglected composer, so often used as torture for aspiring young pianists. Clementi was not only a superb technician with playing and constructing pianos, but he was also a master composer as Misha revealed today. Misha unraveled the secrets behind the notes with an ‘Allegro’ that was truly ‘con espressione.’ From the first notes, lovingly shaped with a refined tonal palette that could reveal a sense of longing and nostalgia within the very sounds that resounded around this most beautiful of churches. Subtle phrasing of great delicacy and poignant beauty. It was the same beauty that he brought to the haunting ‘Lento e patetico’ with a cantabile of weight where the searing intensity of the melodic line was shared with the extraordinary web of accompaniment. An expressiveness that was of sublime simplicity and that from Misha’s sensitive hands could speak with rare beauty and intensity. There was a scintillating brilliance to the ‘Presto’ ,but even here he brought an extraordinary shape and colour to the Mendelssohnian streams of notes. There were ornaments that sprang from his well oiled fingers like springs glistening in this perpetuum mobile of silvery sounds. A beguiling ‘joie de vivre’ of infectious rhythmic elan but always of such rich fantasy and expressive intensity.
Clementi wrote over 100 Sonatas and if this is an example ,as Misha showed us today, please play on and on !
Davidsbündler is one of Schumann’s most beautiful creations and found in Misha an ideal interpreter, creating a sound world that I have rarely experienced in the concert hall. This was a memorable experience where beauty and brilliance were always balanced with poetic intensity and ravishing sounds. A technical mastery that one was not aware of, such was the musical meaning he gave to even the most treacherous passages. The opening was played with a clarity that showed his mastery of the pedal and allowed him to find a beguiling insinuating opening where joy and sorrow are truly mingled. Tenderness and expressiveness mixed with impish good humour and passion. All played with a subtle freedom that sounded almost like an improvisation, as the music must have been when it was still wet on the page. All this was revealed in the first six of these eighteen tone poems. Technical mastery too as the cross rhythms of the sixth passed unnoticed as they just added to the poetic intensity. The seventh was a true reawakening as it slowly took wing with the intensity of the poetic weight that Misha infused into these simple notes. Fleeting lightness , ‘Frisch ‘ indeed, as it burst into a passionate discourse as: ‘Florestan’s lips quivered painfully ‘. There was Brahmsian grandeur too, as the ‘ballade’ of number ten filled every corner of the church with sumptuous full sounds to be experienced again in ‘Wild und lustig’ ,magically dissolving into a chorale of subtle Philadelphian orchestral richness. One of Schumann’s most beautiful creations is the fourteenth and Misha played it with a wonderful sense of balance that allowed the melodic line to pass so simply from one voice to another with even the accompaniment allowed to weave its magic spell. Answered by imperious interruptions and searing romantic intensity before the fidgety meanderings of chattering voices that are interrupted by a magical change of key over a single F sharp. ‘As if from a distance’ we were treated to a vision of loveliness that with this misty acoustic and Misha poetic imagination held us spell bound as we were surrounded by such beauty. Coming to an end only to be reawakened from B minor suddenly to find ourselves in a whispered C major and a ‘Valse de l’adieu’ with twelve chimes in the bass as this dream dissolves ‘as such bliss could be seen in Eusebius’s eyes.’
Such poetic utterances and a performance that I have rarely heard played with such beauty and understanding as today. Something to truly cherish and as Mitsuko Uchida says will grow ever more beautiful in one’s mind as time passes and one relives such a magic moment.
Liszt’s mighty Norma Fantasy opened with dramatic gestures as Misha had now entered the world of Grand Opera,with its rhetorical outpouring of heart rending beauty and breathtaking virtuosity. Liszt could condense this opera into just fifteen minutes and show us every detail of the opera, even correcting the order in which Bellini had written the arias. Misha brought the breathing of a Callas to the great operatic arias that unfolded with such mastery from Misha’s hands. Octaves that were played with the ease that most would play single notes. But these were not just octaves they were waves of sound that took us into realms of the three handed mastery that Liszt and Thalberg could reveal on a piano that now had a ‘soul’ .What wonders there were as Misha struck the timpani with such beguiling insinuation. ‘Arpeggiandi con grandezza’ I have never heard played with such ease as the melodic line was embellished by the devil himself. Breathtaking is the only way one could describe the ‘Presto con Furia’ with a technical mastery that was phenomenal .A relentless drive that I have only heard once before in the concert hall and that was from Gilels in the Spanish Rhapsody. The thrill of live performance is the thrill of the circus entertainer as we sit on the edge of our seats enthralled as we wonder whether he will fall off the high wire or get to the other side triumphantly in one piece !
A quite memorable recital from a pianist who the world awaits with baited breath.
He has recently completed his undergraduate studies at the Royal College of Music and is an ABRSM award holder generously supported by the Eileen Rowe Trust, Talent Unlimited Charity, The Keyboard Charitable Trust and The Robert Turnbull Foundation. He was a Drake Calleja Trust scholar, 2023/4 and is now studying for a Master of Performance with Professor Ian Jones.
Misha is thrilled to be chosen as one of the recipients of the prestigious LSO Conservatoire Scholarships, 2024/5 which will include support and professional development along with coaching and performance opportunities. His recent prizes include RCM Concerto Competition, International Ettlingen Piano Competition, Hopkinson Gold Medal at the Chappell Medal Competition and the 1st and Audience prizes at the 2024 Sheepdrove Piano Competition.
Misha has gained inspiration from lessons and masterclasses with musicians such as Claudio Martínez Mehner, Dmitri Bashkirov, Jerome Lowenthal, Dinara Klinton, Konstantin Lifschitz, Dame Imogen Cooper. He was a participant at the Oxford Piano Festival in 2024, where he was coached by Stephen Kovacevich, Barry Douglas and Kathryn Stott.
His performances with orchestras in UK include debuts in Cadogan Hall playing Rachmaninov’s 1st Concerto with YMSO and James Blair, Liszt’s 2nd Concerto with RCM Symphony orchestra with Adrian Partington and very recently, Rachmaninov’s 4th Concerto performed with the Albion Orchestra.
He has performed in the UK, Italy and France at the venues including St Mary’s Perivale, Razumovsky Recital Hall, Leighton House, Sala dei Notari and Giardini La Mortella with a wide range of solo and chamber repertoire. In 2023 Misha was invited to play Rachmaninoff Symphonic Dances arranged for solo piano at the prestigious Budleigh Literary Festival as a part of Fiona Maddocks conversation about her book “Rachmaninoff in Exile”. He gave recitals for William Walton Foundation in Ischia and recently was invited to play Young Master recital and a chamber recital with the soloists of Umbria Ensemble at the Perugia Music Festival.
Misha’s engagements have included solo recitals in Razumovsky Recital Hall, St Mary Le Strand, 1901 Arts Club, British Institute in Florence and Steinway Hall in Milan. He has performed Chopin F minor Concerto in the National Liberal Club and Brahms 2nd Piano Concerto in Cadogan Hall with James Blair.
1794 portrait. 23 January 1752 Rome – 10 March 1832 Evesham , Worcestershire, England
Muzio Filippo Vincenzo Francesco Saverio Clementi (23 January 1752 – 10 March 1832) was an Italian and British composer,virtuopso pianist ,pedagogue ,conductor, music publisher, editor, and piano manufacturer who was mostly active in England. Encouraged to study music by his father, he was sponsored as a young composer by Sir Peter Beckford, who took him to England to advance his studies. Later, he toured Europe numerous times from his long-standing base in London. It was on one of these occasions, in 1781, that he engaged in a piano competition with Mozart. As a composer of classical piano sonatas, Clementi was among the first to create keyboard works expressly for the capabilities of the piano. He has been called “Father of the Piano”. Clementi composed almost 110 piano sonatas . Some of the earlier and easier ones were later classified as sonatinas after the success of his Sonatinas Op. 36.
Of Clementi’s playing in his youth, Moscheles wrote that it was “marked by a most beautiful legato, a supple touch in lively passages, and a most unfailing technique.” Mozart may be said to have closed the old—and Clementi to have founded the newer—school of technique on the piano.
The F sharp minor Sonata—usually identified as Op 26 No 2 but in fact published originally by Dale of London as the fifth of ‘Six Sonatas for the Piano Forte; dedicated to Mrs Meyrick … Opera 25’ (entered Stationers’ Hall, 8 June 1790)—is an example of what Shedlock in 1895 defined as that class of Clementi work where ‘his heart and soul were engaged’ to the full. The tenor of its first movement is a mixture of dolce expression, capricious fingerwork, off-beat sforzando accents, teasing articulation (the slurs and dots tell in an orchestral way), and tonal surprise The middle slow movement is in B minor, a poignantly felt song, potently textured and voiced, dramatic in its contrasts of soft and loud, of minorial pathos and sweet maggiore release, of dark diminished-seventh tension, of poetically meaningful ornamentation. The 3/8 Presto finale is an imaginatively inventive cameo of Scarlattian brilliance and Mendelssohnian fleetness, of glittering thirds and equally elfin and stormy octaves. Historically, such music is Classical. Temperamentally, it is Romantic.
Franz Liszt 22 October 1811 Doborján, Austrian Empire. 31 July 1886 (aged 74)Bayreuth
During the 1800s opera had a lot of appeal to audiences. From big dramatic storylines to emotional arias, opera was in its prime during this century. Although opera was perceived to have a glamorous aura, it was actually quite inaccessible for a large part of the public due to price and cultural differences. Therefore it is not surprising that many pianists sought to gain more audiences by composing, arranging and performing their own operatic fantasies.
Franz Liszt’s career gained proper traction after he started performing his bravura transcriptions. These were ideal outlets for pianists to show off their virtuosity and prowess over the instrument. On the other hand, they were also ideal for audiences as they were able to access those iconic operatic melodies, just in a slightly smaller and diluted format.Liszt undertook the challenge of diluting Bellini’s opera Norma into a 15 minute solo piano work in 1841. The work easily equals the dramatic impact of the original opera through Liszt’s dynamic and highly virtuosic writing. No less than seven arias dominate Liszt’s transcription of Norma which are threaded together to create a nearly continuous stream of music.
The title role of Norma is often said to be one of the hardest roles for a soprano to sing, and this adds to the drama and intensity of the music. A brief summary of the opera :
“Norma, a priestess facing battle against the Romans, secretly falls in love with a Roman commander, and together they have two illegitimate children. When he falls for another woman, she reveals the children to her people and accepts the penalty of death. The closing scenes and much of the concert fantasy reveal Norma begging her father to take care of the children and her lover admitting he was wrong.”The complex music represents the tragedy woven into this story, which is perhaps why Liszt made the effort to transfer the challenges of this score into a piano fantasy. With cascading arpeggios, massive interval changes and dynamic changes at every turn, Réminiscenes is a true test of technical ability. The score is saturated with huge chordal movement, fast-paced cadenza sequences and a raffle of different tempo markings.
As the Liszt expert Leslie Howard states : ‘The Norma Fantasy stands next to that on Don Giovanni for its ability to capture the essence of the operatic drama in a new structure. It is probably for dramatic reasons that Liszt ignored the famous aria ‘Casta Diva’ (which Thalberg used as the basis for his fantasy) but instead chose no fewer than seven other themes for his gloriously elaborate work—a triumph of understanding not just of Bellini’s masterpiece, but of practically all the sound possibilities of the piano in Romantic literature.’
Robert Schumann, c. 1839 Born 8 June 1810 Zwickau ,Saxony Died 29 July 1856 (aged 46) Bonn
Robert Schumann’s early piano works were substantially influenced by his relationship with Clara Wieck . On September 5, 1839, Schumann wrote to his former professor: “She was practically my sole motivation for writing the Davidsbündlertänze, the Concerto, the Sonata and the Novelettes .” They are an expression of his passionate love, anxieties, longings, visions, dreams and fantasies.
First page the autograph of “Davidsbündlertänze”, Op. 6.
The theme of the Davidsbündlertänze is based on a mazurka by Clara Wieck. The intimate character pieces are his most personal work. In 1838, Schumann told Clara that the Dances contained “many wedding thoughts” and that “the story is an entire Polterabend (German wedding eve party, during which old crockery is smashed to bring good luck)”.
The pieces are not true dances , but characteristic pieces, musical dialogues about contemporary music between Schumann’s characters Florestan and Eusebius. These respectively represent the impetuous and the lyrical, poetic sides of Schumann’s nature. Each piece is ascribed to one or both of them. Their names follow the first piece and the appropriate initial or initials follow each of the others except the sixteenth (which leads directly into the seventeenth, the ascription for which applies to both) and the ninth and eighteenth, which are respectively preceded by the following remarks: “Here Florestan made an end, and his lips quivered painfully”, and “Quite superfluously Eusebius remarked as follows: but all the time great bliss spoke from his eyes.” In the second edition of the work, Schumann removed these ascriptions and remarks and the Tänze from the title, as well as making various alterations, including the addition of some repeats. The first edition is generally favored, though some readings from the second are often used. The suite ends with the striking of twelve low Cs to signify the coming of midnight. The first edition is preceded by the following epigraph:
Alter Spruch In all und jeder Zeit Verknüpft sich Lust und Leid: Bleibt fromm in Lust und seid Dem Leid mit Mut bereit
Old saying In each and every age joy and sorrow are mingled: Remain pious in joy, and be ready for sorrow with courage.
There are 18 sequences :
Lebhaft: Lively (Vivace), G major, Florestan and Eusebius;
Innig: Intimately (Con intimo sentimento), B minor, Eusebius;
Etwas hahnbüchen: Somewhat clumsily (Un poco impetuoso) (1st edition), Mit Humor: With humor (Con umore) (2nd edition), G major, Florestan (hahnbüchen, now usually hanenbüchen or hagebüchen, is an untranslatable colloquialism roughly meaning “coarse” or “clumsy”. Ernest Hutchinson translated it as “cockeyed” in his book The Literature of the Piano.);
Ungeduldig: Impatiently (Con impazienza), B minor, Florestan;
Einfach: Simply (Semplice), D major, Eusebius;
Sehr rasch und in sich hinein: Very quickly and inwardly (Molto vivo, con intimo fervore) (1st edition), Sehr rasch: Very quickly (Molto vivo) (2nd edition), D minor, Florestan;
Nicht schnell mit äußerst starker Empfindung: Not fast, with very great feeling (Non presto profondamente espressivo) (1st edition), Nicht schnell: Not fast (Non presto) (2nd edition), G minor, Eusebius;
Frisch: Freshly (Con freschezza), C minor, Florestan;
No tempo indication (metronome mark of ♩ = 126) (1st edition), Lebhaft: Lively (Vivace) (2nd edition), C major, Florestan;
Balladenmäßig sehr rasch: Balladically very fast (Alla ballata molto vivo) (1st edition), (“Sehr” and “Molto” capitalized in 2nd edition), D minor (ends major), Florestan;
Einfach: Simply (Semplice), B minor–D major, Eusebius;
Mit Humor: With humor (Con umore), B minor–E minor and major, Florestan;
Wild und lustig: Wildly and merrily (Selvaggio e gaio), B minor and major, Florestan and Eusebius;
Zart und singend: Tenderly and singing (Dolce e cantando), E♭ major, Eusebius;
Frisch: Freshly (Con freschezza), B♭ major – Etwas bewegter: With agitation (poco piu mosso), E♭ major with a return to the opening section (with the option to go round the piece once more), Florestan and Eusebius;
Mit gutem Humor: With good humor (Con buon umore) (in 2nd edition, “Con umore”), G major – Etwas langsamer: A little slower (Un poco più lento), B minor; leading without a break into
Wie aus der Ferne: As if from afar (Come da lontano), B major and minor (including a full reprise of No. 2), Florestan and Eusebius; and finally,
Nicht schnell: Not fast (Non presto), C major, Eusebius.
Thomas Luke is not only a pianist but also an accomplished composer, and what shines through all his work is the absolute clarity of his intelligent musicianship. I first heard him eighteen months ago in the final round of the Chappell Gold Medal at the RCM which was being judged by the ever eclectic Jed Distler. We had both noticed the clarity of his playing as I had when he played the Saint Saens second concerto in Lang Lang’s masterclass a year earlier. Young winner of the BBC Competition he has now acquired an authority from working over these past two years with Alim Beisembayev and Vanessa Latarche. We now see a young man who knows what he wants to say and has the means to express it, not only in music but also in words.
His two pieces that were on today’s programme are part of a new CD of his own composition to be imminently released. His words revealed a very deep emotional understanding and poetic reasoning as was mirrored by his striking multi coloured shirt! His two short piano works were followed by a third as a much requested encore. They revealed a music language of mellifluous beauty and ingenious pianistic understanding as the clarity of his playing showed also the direct emotional message that his music carries,with playing of glowing beauty. A sense of balance but above all a chiselled mellifluous beauty of his own voice speaking with such conviction and authority.
To Beethoven he not only brought a clarity but also a rhythmic intensity that was like a wave entering with simple flowing sounds interrupted by Beethoven’s demanding personality and irascible temperament. But in this and it’s twin op 110 Beethoven had found a pastoral landscape of etherial beauty as his temperament was gradually calmed and reassured as he saw the light that awaited him at the end of a long and turbulent tunnel. A light that he resolved in many ways with his expansion of the variation form. In fact his last major work was the Diabelli variations but anticipated by the final movement of these two final sonatas op 109 and 111. Op 110 was more of a joyous acceptance whereas the theme and variations of its twins op 109 and op 111 was of poignant emotional meaning ending in a whisper of deep feeling . Thomas allowed the music to pour from his crystalline fingers with a fluidity as the first movement was like a stream entering and exiting with the simple beauty of a pastoral landscape. The brusque ‘Prestissimo’ was played with burning intensity and brilliance and was remarkable for his absolute fidelity to the score. Dynamic contrasts but above all an architectural understanding that gave such strength to this irascible contrasting movement. It was, though, the ‘Andante molto cantabile ed espressivo’ that allowed Thomas’s playing to glow with poignant meaning. The theme played with simple string quartet texture where each strand was a voice of expressive beauty as the first variation was played with simplicity and intensity. He allowed the ‘leggiermente’ to speak for itself with a gentle forward movement of whispered beauty. The ‘Allegro vivace’ sprang from his well oiled fingers with masterly control and rhythmic drive dissolving so naturally into the mellifluous weavings of the fourth variation. ‘Piacevole’ Beethoven writes and it was this simple beauty that Thomas was able to convey with such clarity and musical intelligence. The fifth and sixth variations were played with a mastery and sense of balance from the ‘Allegro ma non troppo’ of almost military order to the disarming beauty and gradual disintegration and rebirth of the opening theme .’Cantabile’ is all Beethoven writes for this wondrous final variation and it was exactly this that Thomas realised. Trills that were merely vibrations as the theme is envisaged on high before magically returning to earth for the ending of this wondrous story, as it had begun. Thomas played with a purity and scrupulous understanding of Beethoven’s surprisingly meticulous indications exactly following in his mentor, Alim Beisembayev’s masterly footsteps.
The three Brahms Intermezzi were played with exquisite beauty from the gentle lyricism of the E flat through the beguiling ravishing beauty of the B flat minor to the haunting mystery of the C sharp minor. These are works that reveal their deep meaning only to the greatest of musicians who can bring a clarity to the musical line whilst being immersed in sounds of extraordinary colour and subtlety.
Scriabin’s fifth Sonata shot from Thomas’s hands with unexpected vigour and explosive drive. Contrasting with the glowing simplicity of Scriabin’s magical sound world as Thomas built up the tension with masterly control and breathtaking brilliance. Reaching the star, which shone with brilliance and overwhelming passion as it was swept away as it had begun on an impatient glissando of sounds across the entire keyboard (which often reminds me of Beethoven’s impatience in op 106 Scherzo.)
Thomas Luke came to national attention after winning the keyboard category of BBC Young Musician 2020. Driven by a desire for discovery and authentic human connection, he moves freely between traditional concert repertoire, his own compositions, and expansive multi-piano arrangements. His performances have featured on national radio and television, and have taken him to stages worldwide, including London’s Wigmore Hall, Leipzig’s Weißes Haus, the Xiamen International Conference Centre Concert Hall and the Van Cliburn Concert Hall in Fort Worth.
Hailed as a “trailblazer” by Steinway & Sons, Thomas made history by performing the inaugural Steinway SpirioCast between two UK institutions. He was recently awarded the Prix Monti at the 2025 Piano Campus International Competition and has been recognised by the Vienna International Music Competition for his “outstanding talent, a remarkable musicality and a very accomplished technique.” In June 2024, he was selected as one of just 24 Young Artists globally to attend the PianoTexas International Festival, and has participated in lessons and masterclasses with Lang Lang, Arie Vardi and Stephen Kovacevich.
In 2024, he launched Many Pianos – a series of bold, layered arrangements for four or more pianos, blending digital and acoustic elements. His first video, a cover of Jacob Collier’s “Little Blue”, was recognised by Collier himself and has since reached thousands of listeners online. Thomas’ next major release, an album of original music, is due in early 2026.
Born on the Isle of Wight, Thomas’ musical spark was lit in the room under his grandparents’ stairs, playing keyboard games on the organ with his grandfather. He began piano lessons with Judith Harvey aged four, continuing studies with Eleanor Hodgkinson at the Junior Royal Academy of Music. He now studies with Vanessa Latarche at the Royal College of Music as the Margaret Mount Scholar.
The National Liberal Club taken by siege with Jed Distler and Cristian Sandrin as they recount the harrowing tale of Shostakovich’s Leningrad Symphony.
A Symphony on its first performance in 1942 playing to a population starved and encircled by Hitler. A story of defiance and courage and a performance in the Grand Philharmonic Hall also broadcast live to the whole of the USSR , via Radio Leningrad, that was met by applause and tears of joy.
Two remarkable musicians on one piano mesmerised a packed hall with their mastery and total conviction of a story that must never be forgotten. Playing as one for 75 minutes ,delving deep and finding subtle hidden secrets in the score in this original version for four hands, secrets that are not always apparent with the potency of a full symphony orchestra .
Tessa Uys ,whose very distinguished partnership with Ben Shoeman I have reviewed many times, walked all the way from Camden, due to the ‘Tube ‘ strike, to listen to her colleagues play this monumental work
Symphony No. 7 in C major, op. 60, nicknamed the Leningrad Symphony, was begun in Leningrad, completed in the city of Samara (then known as Kuybyshev) in December 1941, and premiered in that city on March 5, 1942. At first dedicated to Lenin , it was eventually submitted in honour of the besieged city of Leningrad , where it was first played under dire circumstances on August 9, 1942, nearly a year into the siege by German forces.
The performance was broadcast by loudspeaker throughout the city and to the German forces in a show of resilience and defiance. The Leningrad soon became popular in both the Soviet Union and the West as a symbol of resistance to fascism and totalitarianism, thanks in part to the composer’s microfilming of the score in Samara and its clandestine delivery, via Tehran and Cairo, to New York , where Toscanini conducted the NBC Symphony Orchestra in a broadcast performance on July 19,1942, and Time magazine placed Shostakovich on its cover. That popularity faded somewhat after 1945, but the work is still regarded as a major musical testament to the 27 million Soviet people who lost their lives in World War II , and it is often played at Leningrad Cemetery, where half a million victims of the 900-day Siege of Leningrad are buried. Shostakovich at first gave the four movements titles”War”, “Reminiscence”, “Home Expanses”, and “Victory”—but he soon withdrew these and left the movements with their tempo markings alone.
Shostakovich said : “I think slowly but I write fast.” In practice this meant that Shostakovich usually had a work completed in his head before he began writing it down. Soviet music critic Lev Lebedinsky, a friend of the composer’s for years, confirmed after the dawn of glasnost under Mikhail Gorbachev that Shostakovich had conceived the Seventh Symphony before Hitler invaded Russia:
The famous theme in the first movement Shostakovich had first as the Stalin theme (which close friends of the composer knew). Right after the war started, the composer called it the anti-Hitler theme. Later Shostakovich referred to that “German” theme as the “theme of evil,” which was absolutely true, since the theme was just as much anti-Hitler as it was anti-Stalin, even though the world music community fixed on only the first of the two definitions.
Another important witness was the daughter-in-law of Maxim Litvinov , the man who served as Soviet foreign minister before the war, then was dismissed by Stalin. She heard Shostakovich play the Seventh Symphony on the piano in a private home during the war. The guests later discussed the music:
And then Shostakovich said meditatively: of course, it’s about fascism, but music, real music is never literally tied to a theme. Fascism is not simply National Socialism, and this is music about terror, slavery, and oppression of the spirit. Later, when Shostakovich got used to me and came to trust me, he said openly that the Seventh (and the Fifth as well) was not only about fascism but about our country and generally about all tyranny and totalitarianism.
Clive Kerridge writes : ‘ There was an enthusiastic reception for KT-supported rising star, Giulia Contaldo‘s recital in Adbaston (Stafford) on Sunday 7th September 2025 .
It opened with her sensitive rendition of Claude Debussy‘s celebrated Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faun, transcribed for piano by his contemporary Leonard Borwick (though Giulia‘s elegantly colourful playing was almost orchestral in its own right!). That was followed with two pieces from Franz Liszt ‘ Légendes‘, concluding with her full-blooded rendition of S175/2, inspired by a legend of Saint Francis of Paola.
Giulia‘s second set maintained the theme of Myths, Legends and Stories, starting with Szymanowski‘s Trois Poèmes, the Polish-Ukrainian composer’s recognised piano masterpiece, which Giulia played with her characteristic pathos and exuberance across the three sections.
The concert concluded with her scintillating playing of another Liszt piece: from Années de Pèlerinage, S160 Vallée d’Obermann, described as ‘achingly beautiful’ by the [Adbaston] host, which received a rousing ovation from the audience.This was an excellent recital by an assured keyboard artist, surely on a trajectory to becoming a recognised international virtuoso soloist.’
Carol Hodgson writes : ‘Once again it was such a pleasure to see you all again and host a KT pianist in Giulia: she was wonderful, and I felt she put her very soul into each piece. I felt transported by music I was hitherto unfamiliar with. She is a powerful player, yet the slightest touch on the keys conveyed such gentleness and sensitivity.’
“Music has the power to bring people together, no matter race, gender, sex, or religion, and it creates emotions unable to be felt in everyday life. It is important to me because it gives my life a new flavour, a new colour, and a new spectrum.” Shunta Morimoto aged 14.
Lina Tufano,artistic director of Incontri presenting the concert
Shunta Morimoto just arrived from Japan to play at La Mortella before concerts in Ireland and London, at the beginning of what will be a very busy season for this twenty year old pianist. Unanimous winner of Hastings International Piano Competition when he was seventeen, and now embarking on a career that has already taken him to Los Angeles to play Brahms 2 having played Beethoven 4 and Liszt 1 with the RPO in England, and when he was only sixteen Rachmaninov 3 with the Tokyo Philharmonic.
A rising star indeed with an insatiable appetite to discover ever more about the mysteries that are hidden within the scores. A quite extraordinary artist that Stanislaw Ioudentich ( winner of Van Cliburn in 2001 and distinguished teacher in Oberlin ,Como and Madrid ) declared quite candidly ‘ is the greatest talent I have ever known.’
Here is Shunta aged fourteen in Fort Worth – Van Cliburn. ” Shunta Morimoto has won first in his category three times in the Piano Teachers’ National Association of Japan Piano Competition, as well as other competitions in his home country, which has led to multiple performances in Tokyo, Yokohama, and his home town of Kyoto. He also placed first in the 2018 Aloha International Piano Competition and subsequently gave concerts in Hawaii, including with the Hawaii Youth Symphony. He says that experience helped him believe in the “magical power of music,” because he could use it to communicate easily where a language barrier may have prohibited him. A student at Momoyama Junior High School, Shunta currently studies with Shohei Sekimoto.”
Shunta has a hand that has been moulded by superb teaching in Japan from a very early age, giving him a flexibility and true weight that never attacks the key but sucks the life blood from each one with beautiful natural horizontal movements , it is like watching a painter in front of his canvas. Delving deep into the scores having been mentored by William Naboré in Rome and Como for the past five years, he has an insatiable appetite to acquire knowledge and share inspiration as he tries to find the true meaning behind the notes bequeathed to posterity by the great composers.
And it was the Great French Overture by Bach that opened Shunta’s two recitals in Ischia. Often known as the seventh Partita, it is a work of great significance and appears on programmes of only the most eclectic musicians such as Andras Schiff or Angela Hewitt. In eleven movements lasting over thirty minutes it opens with an Overture of monumental proportions. Shunta played with commanding authority as the opening flourish immediately held our attention with its nobility and grandeur. Subtle ornaments unwound like springs from his fingers never interfering with the overall outline. It was like a great Gothic Cathedral taking our breath away as we are overwhelmed by such a man made construction. Bursting into life in a spectacular rhythmic way with energy that came from within the notes with a buoyancy and elan of extraordinary eloquence. The genius of Bach bringing back the opening with an ever more poignant nobility. There was a delicacy to the meanderings of the ‘Courante’ and a deliberate fluidity to the ‘Gavottes’ and a decisive brilliance to the ‘Passepieds’. Shunta brought a subtle veiled beauty to the ‘Sarabande’ contrasting with the boisterous dance of the ‘Bourées’. A ‘Gigue’ that just flew from his fingers, but it was above all the ‘Echo’ that Shunta played with impish good humour and enticing rhythmic characterisation. A ‘tour de force’ of concentration and intellectual understanding of a maturity, way beyond Shunta’s twenty years.
It was followed by some of the greatest works by Chopin. Truly masterpieces that the genius of Chopin had created for a piano that had evolved from the earlier keyboard instruments, that now had a sustaining pedal that became the very soul of the piano – to quote Anton Rubinstein. It becomes a full orchestra capable of a variety of sounds where above all Chopin could create new art forms of refined elegance and fantasy. It was this full orchestra that Shunta showed us today choosing Chopin’s only two Fantasies that are art forms that do not conform to the standard practice of the day.Following in Schubert’s footsteps trying to find a form that had logic and cohesion but also the character of operatic proportions where there is a wondrous story to tell. No longer tied down with formal tradition but able to bring a personal spirit to the music as the Romantic era broke away from the formal constraints of the baroque period.
Shunta played the Fantasy with expansive beauty, nobility and delicacy. The opening was like a sunrise with the unfolding of the drama about to explode. A passionate outpouring of extraordinary mastery and a remarkable palette of colours. An unusually long wait before the opening of the central episode that was of extraordinary poignancy. A vision of paradise was opening up with startling simplicity and purity. The passionate return of the opening was played with even more burning intensity disintegrating to a beseeching cadenza with its simple whispered beauty. It was interesting to note the keys that Shunta held silently in the bass to allow the harmonics to reverberate without the cloud of pedal. It was greeted by a miraculous wave of sounds to the final imperious closing chords.
The G flat Impromptu was played with a beguiling beauty of aristocratic good taste. Shunta added another level of fantasy to this work with an extraordinary range of subtle colouring and shaping of the phrases. The gentle whispered return of the opening, after the ravishing noble beauty of the tenor voice of the central episode, I will cherish for a long time. I have always Rubinstein in my ears when I hear this work as he played it with that same aristocratic French heart that he brought to his friend Poulenc’s music. Shunta showed me another side today with a dream like fantasy world of glistening beauty, without loosing any of the refined elegance that is so extraordinary in this wondrous Impromptu.https://youtu.be/mB9MgedVR3o
It was the same magic that he brought to the Barcarolle op 60 which is one of Chopin’s greatest creations. It is a true ‘Lied von der Erde’, starting from the deep bass C sharp that just opens up the piano so that all that follows can float on the continuous gentle wave of the lagoon, creating pure magic. A magic land indeed of a story told with refined beauty but also with passion. Barely touching the keys in the miraculous bel canto central episode as he allowed the music to gradually engulf him as the temperature rose. The extraordinary thing about Shunta’s playing is the depth of sound that is never ungrateful or percussive but comes from deep within the very soul of the music.There was a refined beauty to the final meanderings as we near the sad farewell , with the gentle tenor melody just glowing in the distance.This was a passage that Ravel, the absolute master of colour, so admired. A cascade of notes leading to the final simple vision to this wondrous land of dreams.
Two encores showed off the wonderful jeux perlé and also the beguiling sense of showmanship that is so much part of the Waltzes of Chopin. Op 42 with its intricate knotty rhythms was played with an extraordinary sense of dance and freedom . https://youtu.be/QTebZVST-oM?si=sipmtOeJ3v0EuXrr
The Prelude op 28 n. 3 just flowed from Shunta’s fingers with disarming simplicity as this extraordinary jewel in a crown of 24 problems ( according to Fou Ts’ong) was shaped as the miniature tone poems of each one should be, and that Shunta will treat us to in the National Liberal club in London for halloween .
The second recital was with the addition of the Polonaise- Fantaisie op 61 ,the twin of the Barcarolle op 60. Fantasy was the word for the first chords just opening up a magic world of wondrous whispered sounds. Playing these ‘vibrations’ with one single movement it became truly an undulation of the senses both visual and audial. A Polonaise that burst onto the scene with unusual vehemence and that Shunta played with passionate drive, but there was also a feeling of tenderness and wonder. A beautifully free,almost improvised, central episode where the melodic line passed from the tenor to the soprano register with poetic beauty and tranquility .Gradually trills appeared magically vibrating with ever more intensity until the opening chords return with even more etherial vibrations. Suddenly the intensity increases as Chopin reaches for a climax of exhilaration and nobility played by Shunta with extraordinary power and passion. Octaves flying as the tension diminishes and this fantasy world of genial creation comes to a close on a single isolated A flat.
Lina Tufano with Raffaella our guardian angel in La Mortella
Shunta added to his encore of op 42 that he had played yesterday too, with a magical account of Chopin’s Berceuse.Whispered tones made us listen even more intently to the beauty of the magic web of variations that Chopin could weave,adding to the most beautiful of all lullabies with a rocking motion of sumptuous innocence and beauty.
Signora Lucia the Deus ex Macchina of La Mortella Professor Lina Tufano with an ex student of Avvelino Conservatory The Concert Hall with Linda Alberti who had travelled from Frascati to support Shunta with sigma Anna of La Rondinella beach restaurant after concert dinner 1748 portrait of Bach holding a copy of the canon BWV 1076 Born 21 March 1685 Eisenach Died. 28 July 1750 (aged 65) Leipzig
The Overture in the French style, BWV 831, original title Ouvertüre nach Französischer Art, also known as the French Overture and published as the second half of the Clavier Übung II in 1735 (paired with the Italian Concerto ), is a suite in B minor for a two-manual harpsichord.
The term overture refers to the fact that this suite starts with an overture movement, and was a common generic name for French suites (his orchestral suites were similarly named). This “overture” movement replaces the allemande found in Bach’s other keyboard suites. Also, there are optional dance movements both before and after the Sarabande. In Bach’s work optional movements usually occur only after the sarabande. All three of the optional dance movements are presented in pairs, with the first one repeated after the second, but without the internal repeats. Also unusual for Bach is the inclusion of an extra movement after the Gigue, the “Echo,” a piece meant to exploit the terraced loud and soft dynamics of the two-manual harpsichord. Other movements also have dynamic indications (piano and forte ), which are not often found in keyboard suites of the Baroque period, and indicate here the use of the two keyboards of the harpsichord. With eleven movements, the French Overture is the longest keyboard suite ever composed by Bach. It usually has a duration of around 30 minutes if all the repeats in every movement are taken.
Bach wrote an earlier version of the work, in the key of C minor (BWV 831a) later transposed to B minor to complete the cycle of tonalities in Parts One and Two of the Clavier-Übung.The keys of the six Partitas (B♭ major, C minor, A minor, D major, G major, E minor) of Clavier-Übung I form a sequence of intervals going up and then down by increasing amounts: a second up (B♭ to C), a third down (C to A), a fourth up (A to D), a fifth down (D to G), and finally a sixth up (G to E).[1] The key sequence is continued in Clavier-Übung II (1735) with two larger works: the Italian Concerto, a seventh down (E to F), and the French Overture, an augmented fourth up (F to B♮). Thus a sequence of customary tonalities for 18th-century keyboard compositions is complete, beginning with the first letter of Bach’s name (B♭, in German is B) and ending with the last (B♮ in German is H).
Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin. 1 March 1810. Żelazowa Wola, Duchy of Warsaw. 17 October 1849 (aged 39) Paris. Chopin, 28, at piano, from Delacroix’s 1838 joint portrait of Chopin and SandScreenshot
The Polonaise-Fantaisie in A flat op 61, was dedicated to Mme A. Veyret, written and published in 1846.This work was slow to gain favour with musicians, due to its harmonic complexity and intricate form . Arthur Hedley was one of the first critics to speak positively of the work, writing in 1947 that it “works on the hearer’s imagination with a power of suggestion equaled only by the F minor Fantasy ore the Fourth Ballade ” . It is intimately indebted to the polonaise for its metre, much of its rhythm , and some of its melodic character, but the fantaisie is the operative formal paradigm, and Chopin is said to have referred initially to the piece only as a Fantasy. Parallels with the Fantaisie in F minor include the work’s overall tonality, A-flat, the key of its slower middle section, B major, and the motive of the descending fourth.
Autograph of Chopin Barcarolle central episode
The Barcarolle in F sharp major op 60 composed between autumn of 1845 and summer 1846, three years before his death.[1]
Based on the barcarolle rhythm and mood, it features a sweepingly romantic and slightly wistful tone. Many of the technical figures for the right hand are thirds and sixths, while the left features very long reaches over an octave. Its middle section is in A major , and this section’s second theme is recapitulated near the piece’s end in F-sharp. It is also one of the pieces where Chopin’s affinity to the bel canto operatic style is most apparent, as the double notes in the right hand along with spare arpeggiated accompaniment in the left hand explicitly imitates the style of the great arias and scenas from the bel canto operatic repertoire. The writing for the right hand becomes increasingly florid as multiple lines spin filigree and ornamentation around each other.
This is one of Chopin’s last major compositions, along with the Polonaise – Fantasie op 61 is often considered to be one of his more demanding compositions, both in execution and interpretation.
autograph of the Fantasy
The F minor Fantasy is an expansively constructed work belonging to the sphere of such epic-dramatic genres in the Chopin oeuvre as the ballades and the scherzos. Yet it occupies a distinctive, exceptional place among them. Discounting the rather trivial fantasies of the potpourri type written to operatic or other themes, such as were fashionable in Chopin’s day, we immediately perceive his Fantasy as a work referring to the most splendid and most ambitious traditions of the piano fantasies of Mozart and the Wanderer-Fantasie of Schubert . From Chopin’s letters, we also know that he employed the name ‘fantasy’ to describe works that broke with the canon of unambiguously defined genres (e.g. the Polonaise – Fantaisie ). The term ‘fantasy’ unquestionably implies some sort of freedom from artistic rules and a peculiar, Romantic expression. It was completed and published in 1841. Through its narrative it insistently draws the listener into an expansive musical tale. But can we answer the question as to what this tale is about? In the interpretations of many commentators we find the conviction that Chopin’s work might be an echo of improvisations on national themes (as is indicated by some of the Fantasy’s melodic strands). So Fantasy would contain a distinctive patriotic message, leading from the elegiac tone at the beginning of the work to the triumphant accents in its closing climax.
In the construction of this fascinating composition, we find elements of various forms (e.g. sonata form combined with the principle of cyclical form), yet defining the form of the Fantasy is no easy task, even though the work does display a rigorous logic of construction. We find here moments that are very precisely formed (particular themes) and others of a looser character, akin to improvisation (especially the figural passages). In general terms, the flow of the work may be presented as follows: an introduction with two ‘march’ themes, a sort of exposition of the rich thematic material, a middle section (lyrical, at a slow tempo, in the key of B major), a sort of reprise and a coda (a reminiscence of the middle section). Of course, there are other possible interpretations of this work, which represents a real challenge for performers. It is one of Chopin’s longest pieces, and is considered one of his greatest works.
The 12 Finalists of the 65th Busoni Piano Competition:
Ennian Bai. Elia Cecino Christos Fountos Yungyung Guo Dongyoung Kim Sandro Nebieridze Shion Ota Zeyu Shen Jakub Sládek Zhonghua Wei Yifan Wu (2005) Jialin Yao
The Solo Finals will be held on August 30th & 31st!
The six candidates selected for the Chamber Music Final are:
From September 2 to 4, the candidates will have the unique opportunity to shine both as soloists and as chamber musicians, performing masterpieces by Schumann, Dvořák, Brahms, Shostakovich, and Franck with the prestigious Simply Quartet quartet from Vienna.
Teatro Comunale Stadttheater
FINALISSIMA
Orchestra Haydn Orchestra George Pehlivanian Direttore Dirigent Sandro Nebieridze Sergej Rachmaninov Rapsodia su un tema di Paganini, op. 43 Rhapsodie über ein Thema von Paganini, op. 43 Yifan Wu Ludwig van Beethoven Concerto n. 3 per pianoforte e orchestra in do minore, op. 37 Klavierkonzert Nr. 3 c-Moll, op. 37
– Intervallo – Pause – Christos Fountos Sergej Rachmaninov Concerto per pianoforte e orchestra n. 1 in fa diesis minore, op. 1 Klavierkonzert Nr. 1 fis-Moll, op. 1
Sandro NebieridzeYifan Wu Christos Fountos4th 5th and 6th prize
Lista completa dei premi | Vollständige Preisliste
Premio Fryderyk Chopin Preis Jialin Yao Premio Senior Jury Preis Zhonghua Wei Premio Junior Jury Preis Sandro Nebieridze Premio speciale musica da camera | Sonderpreis für die beste Interpretation eines KammermusikwerkesChristos Fountos Premio speciale per la migliore l’interpretazione di musica pianistica contemporanea | Sonderpreis für die überzeugendste Interpretation zeitgenössischer Klaviermusik Zhonghua Wei Premio per l’esecuzione di un’opera di Busoni | Preis für die überzeugendste Interpretation eines Werkes von Busoni Yangrui Cai Keyboard Career Development PrizeYifan Wu Premio Alice Tartarotti Preis Yifan Wu
Grazie a FORST, Main Sponsor della Finalissima | Danke an FORST, Hauptsponsor des Grand Finale
Genius is certainly not easy to live with as we have experienced today from a young man who I have followed and admired for some years whilst he has been studying with Dmitri Alexeev. A young boy who could master some of the most complicated works ever written for the keyboard from Bach’s Goldberg Variations to Beethoven’s Diabelli. Then we experienced the rebellious youth with flowing locks and individual ideas. Today we are experiencing a young man where every sound he makes on the keyboard touches him almost painfully. I remember Graham Johnson with whom I shared chamber music lessons with John Streets, who would tell him that he did not have to play as though a knife was being driven into him with every note he played. But there was a super sensibility to sounds that touched him so deeply and is why and how he has become the Gerald Moore of our day . I often tell aspiring young ‘virtuosi’ to listen to Graham to learn how to make the piano sing.
Jackie’s is a very exciting talent because it is a real voyage of discovery that is continually evolving. Of course what comes across is his passionate love of the sounds he is making and how they touch him so deeply. Sometimes with exaggeration as there are no half measures with his all or nothing playing of searing intensity.But as Barbirolli was to say in defence of Jacqueline Du Pré, often criticised for playing with too much passion and extravagance, ‘ If you don’t play with passion in your youth what do you pare off in maturity?’.
Certainly to see Jackie hit the final three D’s of the preludes with his fist is hard to accept or his strange arrangements of notes in the third prelude or the jiggery pokery of alternate hands for the vibrating flourishes of the Polonaise – Fantaisie.This was a small price to pay for a Chopin Nocturne op 62 n.1 that had a rare sense of freedom with a wondrous range of colour. Less successful was the Polonaise -Fantaisie op 61 where his playing lacked an overall architectural shape, sacrificing it for some memorable moments.Proven by the fact that he played the final A flat like a shot in the dark instead of like a gentle closing of fantasy as it had opened.The Barcarolle op 60 the twin of the Polonaise too, starts with a deep C sharp that just opens up the sonority of the piano and closes with the same sound. The actual climax of the work, as with the Polonaise Fantaisie comes long before the end.
It was in the smaller forms that the true genius of this young man rang out so memorably. Fou Ts’ong called these Preludes 24 problems because they each have problems, whether interpretative or technical, and Jackie imbued each one with life or death intensity that kept us enthralled.These well known preludes were reborn as he recreated each one with burning passion and ravishing beauty. Nowhere in this consideration have I spoken about the technical mastery and perfection of this young man, which was remarkable. It was just the means to allow him to express the deep inner meaning that the music provoked in him.
Waving his hands like a painter before they actually stroked the canvas with the improvised freedom of the first prelude. A deep brooding to the second where the accompaniment almost eat the melody live as it was allowed a voice of its own. No idea why he wanted to play the opening of the third with two hands when he has a technical mastery the envy of most! He allowed the melodic line, though, to float above this wave of sounds.The famous fourth prelude was played with a drama enacted with riveting intensity followed by the subtle brilliance of fifth and the ravishing beauty of the melodic line in the sixth. The seventh may be the shortest prelude but when played as Jackie did it became a breath of fresh air of glowing beauty.
It was the eighth which ignited the passion and burning intensity within this young man where he was allowed this outlet with playing of mastery and conviction. The grandeur of the ninth with its sumptuous climax and miraculous ending was followed by a brilliant fleeting jeux perlé just ornamenting the sumptuous melodious chords of arrival. A beguiling rubato to the eleventh where the branches of Chopin’s trees were allowed to flow with extraordinary natural beauty and freedom. A burning intensity to the twelfth with its dynamic drive. The thirteenth in many ways the most strikingly beautiful of the preludes was played old style with broken hands because he was searching for the magic sounds that the great pianists of the past knew lay in the cracks. Jackie listening to every note with quite extraordinary sensibility. The wind of the fourteenth ,a mere breeze as it built in intensity only to burn itself out revealing the radiant beauty of the ‘Raindrop’. A real tone poem opened as the central episode unwound with disturbing turbulence.The sixteenth with its study like brilliance was played with the amazing assurance of a young virtuoso who must now listen more to the bass which will give more meaning and depth of sound to this study that is above all a miniature tone poem. Beautiful long lines and ravishing freedom to the seventeenth was greeted by the dynamic cadenza of the eighteenth. The nineteenth is one of the technically most difficult of the preludes ,but in Jackie’s masterly hands it became the Aolean Harp of Chopin’s dreams. The mighty C minor was played with the enormous conviction of this young artist as it disappeared so magically, leaving the beautifully mellifluous twenty-one to lead us to the final three preludes , played with poetic fantasy and passionate persuasion. A remarkable performance full of blemishes and exaggerations but the preludes have never kept me riveted to the seat as much as they did today. This was a young man with a poetic soul gradually coming to terms with his youthful passion and mastery , where his deep love for music was overpowering and deeply moving. I look forward to the next instalment in Jackie’s thrilling voyage of discovering himself through his music.
The waltz op 18 was an unexpected encore. It was played with brilliance rather than charm, starting with chiselled notes that might well have broken the toes of Les Sylphydes!
Jackie is a great artist who is living, searching, suffering every moment as he strives to recreate the vision of his poetic sound world.
Jacky Zhang is a young composer, pianist, songwriter, and producer. Still only 17 he is a fourth year undergraduate currently studying piano and composition at the Royal College of Music. He has won the first prize of the UK Piano Open International Competition in 2020, Premio Alkan International Piano Competition in 2022, and both Classical and Romantic sections at the Cantù International Piano and Orchestra Competition in 2023 and was a finalist in the BBC Young Musician 2024. Jacky has performed at many festivals and venues and has played concertos by Saint-Saëns, Mozart, Beethoven, and Rachmaninoff with well-known world-class conductors.
Beethoven Piano Society of Europe | Jed Distler Concert Wednesday, September 3, 1.10 pm sees the latest in our St James Piccadilly lunchtime series. We were lucky enough to be able to secure a date for the extraordinary New York-based pianist and composer Jed Distler on his current European tour. Many of you will also know Jed as perhaps the world’s leading authority on piano recordings, historical and modern.
Jed after all the Beethoven Sonatas was quite happy to add the Funeral March from the Eroica Symphony before entering into his unique sound world.
I had met Jed at a musical fair in Cremona and we hit it off immediately but then who wouldn’t ! Jed knows more about pianos and pianist than anyone alive or dead and is also one of the nicest people I know .It is an honour to have him as a guest in my house but he asked me not to write about his concert today so as not to be accused of conflict of interests. So ‘mum’s’ the word but the recording is here and can be enjoyed at your leisure without any words from me !
So I am not writing any more than to say I have rarely heard this Fazioli- or any other come to that – sound so beautiful as it did today!
I look forward to his performance of Shostakovich ‘Leningrad’ Symphony with Cristian Sandrin next week ,and there I will let rip with unconstrained praise and admiration for two such eclectic musicians
I have heard Tessa and Ben play many of the Scharwenka transcriptions of the Beethoven Symphonies over the past seven years. It is very touching to see the old battered copy of the Symphonies on the piano stand and know that it was the very copy that stood in her mother’s studio when Tessa was growing up.
Tessa and Ben are both highly esteemed artists not only in their homeland but also in their adopted home in London. Since those early days when I first heard them they have been discovered and have now made some highly acclaimed CD’s as a piano duo. As Dr Mather said St Mary’s may be too small for an orchestra but Sharwenka has proven him wrong, as today we heard the Pastoral Symphony in all it’s glory on this newly restored piano that is more used to Sonatas than Symphonies.
Tessa and Ben over the years have truly learnt how to play as one with an extraordinary sense of balance created by two great artists that listen to themselves and adjust accordingly. Tessa may have been at the bass end for the Beethoven but even when she played at the top the balance was just as superb.
I have written many times about their Beethoven performances but today I was overwhelmed by their superb performance of Elgar. The Introduction and Allegro like the violin or cello concerti have something so unique about the sound world that one can envisage the green pastures and wondrous landscapes that surrounded the composer as he wrote music that fits the era of Bernard Shaw or Constable and fills it with such sumptuous rich sounds.
The British Brahms you could almost call him and when I hear this music I immediately envisage Sir John Barbirolli or Sir Adrian Boult who I was lucky enough to experience in my student days at the Royal Academy and Royal College that I frequented almost daily in my teenage years. I remember Barbirolli when I, like Tessa, was a student at the Royal Academy, and I followed his rehearsals with the student orchestra. I can still see this short very passionate man walking through the cello section and looking the players in the eye to get them to play with more passion. The first recording of the cello concerto with Jaqueline du Pré is legendary but she was often criticised for playing with too much passion. ‘ But if you don’t play with passion when you are young what will you pare off later in life?’ Little was he to imagine that we would never know ,as she was struck down at only 28. Luckily she had Daniel Barenboim at her side who had managed to give her the maturity and security that only true love between genius can provide. A Golden couple indeed!
Boult on the other hand at the college would stand on the podium like a Military gentleman waving a very long stick. But the intelligence and passion that the stick contained was a great lesson indeed and it was his recording of the Elgar Introduction that I would play over and over again as a student.
Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony is one of the marvels of creation and the fantasy and imagination that Beethoven was able to portray was made even more poignant by the titles he gave each movement.
It was such a good idea to play these two ‘Pastoral’ gems one after the other. Not to compare but to wallow in genius that can portray in music such wondrous scenes. Tessa suggested, as a future project , Bruckner Symphonies in the arrangement of Otto Singer which sounds like a wondrous voyage of discovery .
I know that Jed Distler ,who will shortly play in Perivale is preparing Shostakovich Leningrad symphony with Cristian Sandrin that they will play in London shortly.He is also playing four hands all the Mahler Symphonies. St Mary’s may be redundant no longer !! Watch out Hugh ……….as the little one said move over !
In 2010, Tessa Uys and Ben Schoeman established a duo partnership after being invited to give a two-piano recital at the Royal Over-Seas League in London. Ever since, they have performed regularly at music societies, festivals and at the BBC. They have recorded six volumes encompassing the nine symphonies by Beethoven arranged for piano duet by Xaver Scharwenka, alongside two-piano works by Schumann, Saint-Saëns and Busoni for SOMM Recordings. They have received praise for this “landmark” project, and it has been described as a “tour-de-force” in the BBC, Gramophone and International Piano Magazines.
Tessa Uys Born in Cape Town, Tessa Uys was first taught by her mother, Helga Bassel, herself a noted concert pianist. At sixteen, she won a Royal Schools Associated Board Scholarship and continued her studies at the Royal Academy of Music in London where she studied with Gordon Green. In her final year she was awarded the MacFarren Medal. Further studies in London with Maria Curcio, and in Siena with Guido Agosti followed. Shortly after this Tessa Uys won the Royal Over-Seas League Competition and was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy of Music. During the past decades, Tessa Uys has established herself an impressive reputation, both as concert performer, and as a broadcasting artiste, performing at many concert venues throughout the world. She has performed at the Wigmore Hall, Southbank, Barbican and St John’s Smith Square, and has played under such distinguished conductors as Sir Neville Marriner, Walter Susskind, Louis Frémaux and Nicholas Kraemer. https://www.impulse-music.co.uk/tessauys/
Ben Schoeman Steinway Artist, Ben Schoeman was the first prize laureate in the 11th UNISA International Piano Competition in Pretoria, winner of the gold medal in the Royal Over-Seas League Competition in London and was also awarded the contemporary music prize at the Cleveland International Piano Competition. He has performed in prestigious halls on several continents, including the Wigmore, Barbican and Queen Elizabeth Halls in London, Carnegie Hall in New York, the Konzerthaus in Berlin, the Gulbenkian Auditorium in Lisbon, Cape Town City Hall and the Enescu Festival in Bucharest. As a concerto soloist he has collaborated in over 40 works with conductors including Diego Masson, Gérard Korsten, Yasuo Shinozaki, Bernhard Gueller, Jonathan McPhee and Wolfram Christ. He studied piano with renowned musicians such as Joseph Stanford, Michel Dalberto, Boris Petrushansky, and Eliso Virsaladze, and obtained a doctorate in music from City, University of London and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama with a thesis on the piano works of the composer Stefans Grové whose African-inspired music Schoeman has premiered and performed in numerous countries. Over the past decade, he has been a senior lecturer and research fellow at the University of Pretoria. He has served on the jury of international music competitions and his students have won top prizes. www.benschoeman.com
Franz Xaver Scharwenka born: 6 January 1850 died: 8 December 1924
Franz Xaver Scharwenka was born on 6 January 1850 at Samter, near the Polish city of Poznan, which was then in East Prussia. Both Xaver and his older brother Philipp (1847–1917) showed early signs of musical talent and were much encouraged by their father in their first music lessons. In 1865 the Scharwenka family moved to Berlin where the two brothers were enrolled at Theodor Kullak’s Neue Akademie der Tonkunst. Xaver made rapid progress, studying the piano with Kullak himself, a pupil of Carl Czerny, and composition with Richard Wuerst who in turn had studied with Mendelssohn in Leipzig. This formal musical education, together with his own natural ability and dedication, ensured Scharwenka’s success as both pianist and composer, and in 1869, a year after his pianistic debut at the Berlin Singakademie, his first compositions were published. Before 1874, when he took up a career as a travelling virtuoso, he had already been on Kullak’s teaching staff for some five years as professor of piano, and the experience thus gained was to prove invaluable in later years when he turned his attentions more to teaching, opening his own conservatory in Berlin in 1881, and subsequently a branch in New York in 1891 following his successful American debut. By the middle of the 1890s that institution had become one of the world’s largest, universally acknowledged as offering the highest quality of musical education. It was the outbreak of war in 1914 which forced Scharwenka’s retirement from the international concert platform after some forty years, during which time he had achieved the highest reputation worldwide, not only as a pianist of exceptional quality but also as a fine all-round musician, receiving numerous decorations and orders from most of the crowned heads of Europe, as well as many honours from various educational institutions. The last few years of his life were spent in semi-retirement in Berlin, where he died, a much respected man, in December 1924.
Otto Singer Jr., (September 14, 1863 – January 8, 1931), composer and conductor, produced piano transcriptions of all nine of Beethoven’s symphonies, at least 57 of Liszt’s songs, all four of Brahms’s symphonies, vocal-piano reductions (vocal parts plus solo piano) of 12 of Wagner’s operas (as well as instrumental solo piano versions for some of them), as well as transcriptions of other works by Richard Strauss, Brahms, Beethoven, Bruckner, Tchaikovsky, Mozart, and Mahler, among others including this Elgar
ChristopherAxworthy-MusicCommentary 