A very fine performance of the Beethoven Triple Concerto op 56 with Enyuan Khong,violin,Pedro Silva,cello, and the conductor Jack Wong directing from the keyboard was followed by a truly elegant performance by the young french composer/ pianist Thibault Charrin of Rachmaninov 3rd Piano concerto.
Jack Wong directing Beethoven from the keyboard
A group of young musicians under the name of Hornton Chamber Orchestra gave a sumptuous performance in which the strings in particular were passionately involved and the technical skill of the whole ensemble was impeccable.
The flute of Marcus Dawe was singled out for applause at the end of the Rachmaninov but it could have been for any of the other members of this very fine ensemble.
Jack Wong is the resident music scholar at the Hornton Street House and founder of the Hornton Chamber Orchestra from which it takes its name.A curriculum that states he graduated with first class honours from the Royal Academy of Music where he studied violin with Levon Chillingirian and Rodney Friend!
But there he was tonight playing the very difficult piano part in Beethoven’s Triple Concerto whilst conducting from the keyboard!
Later conducting a sumptuous performance of Rachmaninov.
A Rachmaninov that saw at the helm the young composer who I had seen premier his violin sonata recently with Enyuan Khong at St James’s Piccadilly in a concert promoted by Talent Unlimited.
An amazing group of musicians gathered together for the joy of making music together.
A Beethoven strictly held together in a very rhythmic performance that allowed Beethoven’s energy to shine through and at the same time to herald an extremely lyrical period of his life that culminated in the Fourth Piano Concerto op 58 and the Pastoral Symphony op 68.This Triple Concerto op 56 is one of the most serene of all his concertos.
Beautiful play between the soloists commented on by the orchestra in a perfect ensemble held together from the keyboard by Jack Wong.
The Rachmaninov 3rd piano concerto is the Everest of all concertos and its heights were scaled by our young french composer pianist with great elegance and lyricism.
Rather than the usual barnstorming performances we have got used too by showmen on their warhorse.
This did not exclude exilarating moments of transcendental piano playing but they were always at the service of this extremely lyrical and elegant vision of our young soloist.
The ensemble was kept well under control by the conductor who now could leave the piano playing to his colleague and concentrate on encouraging these very fine young players to listen to each other and unite their youthful passion in these glorious romantic melodies.
The flute player was singled out for his very beautiful playing at the end of the cadenza but it was the sumptuous strings that were equally as remarkable.
Some very fine playing from an ensemble that will obviously go from strength to strength.
Today’s programme for the RCM coffee concert series
It is a beautiful idea to be able to wake up on a sunday morning to the sound of music in Queen Victoria’s monument to her dearly beloved husband Albert.
Here in what has been re-cristened the Elgar Room one can hear some of the prize students from their next door neighbour the Royal College of Music.
In 1884 it was known as the West Theatre and Mr Barton,a student of the RCM, performed Chopin’s 3rd Ballade on the 2 July to open a programme that included Mozart, Handel,Gluck,Schumann and Haydn.
A beautifully elegant, if sparsely decorated room with large windows that look on to the Albert Monument opposite in Kensington Gardens.
130 years on great photos of Frank Sinatra,Ella Fitzgerald and the Beatles now adorn the walls.In the corner on a podium is the Yamaha Grand Piano that Elton John used for his Red Piano Tour that has now been very generously bequeathed to the Albert Hall by Marksons Pianos.
It is a piano that was created for the very special world of Elton John where its bark is as good as it’s bite.
Unfortunately J.S. Bach,which was the first half of today’s programme is music based on the song and the dance.
This instrument,though, was created for a quite different song and dance act based on amplification and mechanical reproduction to satisfy the thousands of fans that flock to Elton John’s concerts.
I have heard Victor Maslov play many times and although still only in his early twenties he has an enviable curriculum.
Starting as a child in Moscow at the Gnessin Special School,taught by his mother Olga Maslova .
He later became a scholar of the Vladimir Spivakov Foundation.Masterclasses with Dmitry Bashkirov and now completing his advanced studies with Dmitri Alexeev at the RCM.
It is nice to see that he became one of the first Eileen Rowe Musical Trust Award Holders.
Miss Rowe was a remarkable teacher in Ealing who dedicated her life to the children in her care.
Ilya Kondratiev and Andreas with Victor Maslov
She even left all her worldly goods to create this fund for exceptionally talented but needy young musicians of which Victor is a beneficiary.
As a student together with Katherine Stott,Daniel Salamon and many others we would help her prepare her numerous young students for their piano exams in her house that was full of pianos in every room.
Ilya Kondratiev Linn Rothstein,Canan Maxton,Andreas and Victor Maslov
Ilya Kondratiev who like Victor is also helped by Talent Unlimited of Canan Maxton came to hear his colleague having played in this very room some years ago.
Victor Maslov will play Rachmaninov’s 3rd Concerto in the Queen Elisabeth Hall on the 2 July with the Orchestra of the RCM in a special showcase concert in one of the major halls in London.
It was in fact Rachmaninov that made up a large part of Victor’s programme today.
The complete Etudes Tableaux op 39 and the arrangement of the Bach suite from the Partita n. 3 fro violin BWV 1006.
The Bach Toccata in E minor BWV 914 that opened the programme immediately showed his transcendental technique and musicianship to the full.The rhythmic energy and his total command allowed us to enjoy certain aspects of this rarely played piece.The layers of colour and different registers of sound were just not possible to fully convey on this rather bright instrument.
The Rachmaninov transcription of the Violin Suite fared better as the slight retouches to the original Bach score allowed more use of the pedals and added a more sumptuous sound.The Menuet was played with great charm and added a brief respite from the more rhythmic knotty twine of the outer movements.
This opened the way to the world of Rachmaninov with his Etudes Tableaux op 39.
A technical command that knows no difficuties and a sense of style that is in his Russian blood.
From the very first notes we were carried away by the sheer sweep of the first study.A range of orchestral sounds from the deep bass to the tender treble.The second study revealed a beautiful cantabile thanks to his very careful sense of balance leading to a startling climax dissolving magically to end this little tone poem.
A great call to arms in the 3rd study of transcendental virtuosity with enormous sonorities that dissolved to almost a whisper tinged with that typical Rachmaninovian nostalgia .
The 4th study could have been more playful and seemed rather too ‘serioso’ to contrast with the passionate declamations of the famous E flat minor study n.5. His great sense of balance allowed the melodic line to sing out gloriously ,even on this piano, above the most passionate outpourings.
The absolute clarity of the scary “ Red Riding Hood” study n.6 led to the sonorous brooding harmonies and pealing bells of the 7th with its insistent repeated notes.
Victor was able to find a beautiful delicate legato for the double notes of the pastoral like 8th study similar to op 10 n.10 of Chopin.It led to the final call to arms of the 9th study.
Great sonorities and orchestral sounds were magically drawn from this piano that I am sure was not used to the transcendental pianism of this young Russian virtuoso.
A wake up call indeed on this beautiful Sunday morning.
I remember in my youth Sir John Barbirolli taking under his wing three young stars :Janet Baker,Jaqueline Du Pre and John Ogdon and helping them to shine as only he could have done.
Unforgettable recordings of The Sea Pictures with Janet Baker,the Elgar concerto with Jaqueline Du Pre and the Tchaikowsky concerto and Cesar Franck Symphonic Variations with John Ogdon.Later Daniel Barenboim joined this elite group as he was joined for life with Jaqueline Du Pre.
A golden era that will never be forgotten.
The New CD of original works by John Ogdon played by Tyler Hay
John Ogdon had studied with Gordon Green in Manchester and became part of an exciting group of young composers that included Harrison Birtwistle and Peter Maxwell Davies.He was able to read at sight the most difficult scores and premiered many of their works.
He was a piano genius.
A giant in every sense who went on to take the Tchaikowsky Gold Medal on the Russian’s own soil.Their star pianist Vladimir Ashkenazy tied for the medal much to the surprise of a world that was looking on in astonishment.
First page of the Sonata dedicated to Stephen Bishop
His talent was indeed superhuman and it was the weight of this talent that became too much for a single mind to bear.We watched on in alarm as his behaviour became more and more erratic leading inevitably to a total breakdown.
Only those that were close to him could have known what torment his genius had given him.
It has taken a young pianist,Tyler Hay to discover in the archives of the Royal Northern College the manuscripts of over 200 original works by Ogdon himself.
He has now brought a selection of them to life on a new CD .
It was today that he presented for the Park Lane Group at St Martin in the Fields the mamoth Sonata in three movements dedicated to Stephen Bishop – Kovacevich.
A large scale work in three movements as Tyler rightly says influenced by Prokofiev and Scriabin.
Great clusters of notes and enormous sonorities in the first movement.
A slow movement with whispering trills high up on the keyboard.
A final movement that even Tyler admitted scared the life out of him for the transcendental difficulty of the piano writing.
A lunchtime audience that listened in total silence as the relentless forward movement of the performance completely overwhelmed them.
With a shimmering performance of the “Jeux d’eau a la Villa d’Este” from his newly released CD.
It paved the way for a scintillating Rhapsody in Blue by Gershwin.
The same extraordinary virtuosity that he had demonstrated in the Ogdon now put at the service of this sumptuous showpiece full of the spicy jazz idioms that have made it an evergreen favourite.
It was the great teacher Nadia Boulanger who turned Gershwin away from her class in Paris saying that she did not want to ruin his quite unique natural talent.
A sparkling crystal clear performance of a Scarlatti Sonata in B minor brought this extraordinary recital to an end.
Greeted by many of the public afterwards and even offered the possibility of a concert at the Shalin Liu Performance Centre in Massachusetts such was the impact of his performances on the public today.
friends and admirers from the Liberal club and the Park Lane Group
admirers from a cruise ship where he had performed making a special journey from Reading for today’s concert
Such a busy week in the sweltering heat of Rome that only now can I listen to the recital streamed live from Perivale.
I had asked Umberto and Hugh Mather if they could leave it on line for a few days to give me a chance to catch up.
Whilst Umberto was playing in London his teacher from the Accademia di S.Cecilia in Rome,Benedetto Lupo, was holding his recital diploma final recitals.
Umberto did this last year whilst he was also studying for a Doctorate in Busoni at the Royal Academy in London.
Paul Tortelier looking on as the concert from Perivale was streamed to Rome
Little did Umberto know that he was playing under the vigilant eye of Paul Tortelier!
Not only is Umberto a magnificent pianist but also a very sensitive intellectual who has delved deep into the works he plays.
Hardly surprising as he comes from the school of two master musicians: Benedetto Lupo in Rome and Ian Fountain in London.
The Respighi Ancient Airs and Dances , better known in the orchestral version ,were described as almost Busoni type transcriptions.
Busoni with hints of Grainger and Vaughan Williams I would say.
Some remarkable feats of piano playing in his use of finger legato and very scarse use of the pedals.
Great sonorities too when needed but it was the refined clarity that he was able to produce that was quite astonishing.
Still two hands at the beginning of the Chopin Barcarolle!
He has almost convinced me that artistically it is absolutely right.
Why Chopin did not write it is a mystery!
Once the gondoler had floated out to calmer waters the beautiful continuous melodic invention was spun with great poetry.
The passion of a young man and not the simplicity of a man already consumed by disease though.
It was interesting that in the introduction to Beethoven op 109 Umberto pointed out that the link between Chopin and Beethoven was their need in their last years to sing rather than astonish or take by storm.
It was this extreme cantabile that was so overwhelming in a work we have heard so many times.
The first movement was pure song .One that had begun long before we could overhear it.
The aristocratic sense of song in the last movement was linked also to a sense of equilibrium and control that in moments of abandon created an almost unbearable tension.
Released only in the long trills that are such a trade mark of the last sonatas of Beethoven.
A winding up and gradual release of tension.
A man with a soul that was on the edge of desperation and frustration as he inhabited ever more his world of total silence.
The celestial sounds only he could experience and try to decribe to us mortals with paper and pen.
It was interesting to know that Busoni wrote his Toccata in exile in Switzerland during the first world war.
Drawn all his life between Italy and Germany now he had to suffer also the strain of war.
All this is in his Toccata that received a superb performance.
His” party piece” as Benedetto Lupo told me.
And very remarkable it is too.
Every bit as remarkable as that of Serkin who played it in London many years ago together with the last Sonata of Beethoven and Reger Theme and Variations.
Those were the days when Rachmaninoff 3 and Prokofiev 2 were still on the horizon for a chosen few who could master notes.
Real intellect and study were in the hands of masters like Serkin and Kempff .
Bravo Umberto for shining a light on an ever more predictable piano scene.
Dudamel in Rome with the Orchestra of the Accademia di S.Cecilia……
Beethoven Egmont
Symphonies 4&7
The joy of music was written all over his face and his humility to be one of the boys in the band.
He refused to mount the podium once his job was done.
Obviously the orchestra loved him as did the audience.
What he lacks in refinement he makes up for with his infectious love for music.
Real Latin temperament that favours the drums rather than the distilling of rarefied sounds.
Ten years at the helm of the Los Angeles Philharmonic have put them on the map so the PR boys chant in the programme.
Maybe they forgot Giulini who was there in his final glorious years before moving back to Milan!
Some silver sheen to the curly mop that took the world by storm with his Bolivar Orchestra with their gloriously outragious S.American music and attire.
Discovered by Abbado in Venezuela and invited to Europe.
When they arrived in Rome for the first time,the aristocratic season ticket audience went crazy for them.
Lights off.
A quick change into track suits and they were throwing their instruments in the air whilst playing!
Certainly not the refined music making in dress suits that we were used to!
This is the raw music making of the exilarating discovery of music rather than the rough dangerous world on the streets.
A passion and something to strive for that is far removed from the hunger and crime that was their birthright.
I was at a party in London when they were invited for the first time to the proms.
Some of the guests were coming on after the concert.
One of them the leader of the LSO.
Well they arrived at the party with such wondrous tales and such exilaration.
Sala S.Cecilia Rome
Dudamel and his band of the Experiment had spun their web and taken London by storm.
The spell was set and now in middle age the same wondrous joy of music making has remained in tact.
When you come from such a deprived background your fairy godfather you never forget.
Some very fine playing from 20 year old Francesco Granata His beautifully relaxed arms and agile fingers brought the two Scarlatti sonatas to life with some magical phrasing and dynamics.
Strange fingering in the B minor but what enjoyment he was transmitting.
Schumann Carnaval and above all Mussorgsky “Pictures” showed of his beautifully wide ranging sound palette.
Francesco Granata greeted by an admirer after his recital
Always beautiful sounds due to his completely natural technical mastery.
As he matures he will allow the music to speak more naturally and simply and not feel he has to “do things”as Brendel would say.
Matteo Londero at 30 has a more mature musicianship.
Some very solid playing with some really sumptuous colours in Prokofiev 2nd Sonata.
Some beautiful things in the Schumann 8th Novelette but I would have not have stopped after each section but tried to join as one .
Not having the same flexibility as Granata but some very refined serious musicianship.He also brought great weight to his “Waldstein” sonata.
Axel Trolese had both the flexibility of Granata and the solid musicianship of Londero.
He also had that sense of fantasy that allowed him to whisper and roar when needed.
Matteo Londero with Francesco Granata
Just what was needed for the beautiful opening of Beethoven`s op 27 n.1 …..the poor relation of the so called “Moonlight”‘.
Here it was treated as the great work it was in the hands of Arrau or Cherkassky.
Beautifully played the three pieces that make up Albeniz Iberia.
A great sense of balance and delicacy allied to a rhythmic precision which is so essential in these evocative tone poems.
Axel Trolese
I have heard his Chopin B minor Sonata a month ago in Benedetto’s class concert and Axel rose to the occasion today and was awarded the highest honours.
Speaking to Costanza Principe afterwards I told her about Axels Chopin and how I hoped he might slow it down a bit.
“Lucky him who can play so well” was her just reply.
Costanza Principe applauding her colleagues .Her turn will come next year
The set pieces by Fabio Vacchi played with the score showed off the digital and fantasy of each pianist.
Crisp and clean from Granata,more.cerebral and deep from Londero and full of colour and fantasy from Axel.
Three full recitals from very fine pianists endowed with the musical values that Benedetto Lupo has so generously shared in their time together at the Accademia in Rome.
Jonathan Ferrucci in London for the Keyboard Trust
He played the Bartok sonata magnificently.
Crystal clear decisive rhythms.
Deeply expressive second movement.
Spontaneous applause after the first movement and cheers at the end of the last.
The Bach/Kempff played with a clarity that took me by surprise as I have become used to more romantic overpedalled performances.
This was startlingly shorn of rhetoric and sugary rubatos but so much more expressive because of it.
He introduced the Schumann Fantasie himself and gave a very fine performance as you would expect from a disciple of Joan Havill
A great sense of rhythmic drive and overall sense of line.
I would have tried to link the second movement to the third.
But this is a real thinking musician like Ivan Krpan that does not move if not convinced.
The coda of the second movement was very secure and musically shaped.
Slightly missing the magic that this fine but small Steinway just did not have.
The ending was beautifully controlled and the final crescendo/accelerando well judged.
It is rare to find such a well thought out and finely planned performance of this much maligned masterpiece.
An encore.
Two for the price of one!
Scriabin nocturne op.9 became the study op. 42 n.5.
He had reworked the study in a day at my request not having played it for some time.
He has more than confirmed the successes that Jacques Samuel, Guildhall and Padua have already demonstrated.
Helped and admired by Angela Hewitt he is a major player in an overfull profession.
He is also very intelligent and simpatico.
His father is a writer of psychology in Florence ….his mother is Australian.
This is what I wrote about him in Padua which also talks about his first remarkable teacher in Florence.
The original programme changed to accomodate Liszt Valse Oubliee n.1
Tyler just played at Hatchlands on Thalberg’s 1845 Erard.
He had to change Jeux d`eau a la Villa d`Este as the keyboard was shorter than Liszt`s later Erard.You can read about Liszt’s piano and the Villa D’Este here:
He played Valse oubliee n.1….worked up in the half hour before the concert.
Introducing the programme he showed a mastery and control not only on the Keyboard but like Mark Viner he can explain and enthuse so well his unique scholarship.
Never having played a historic instrument before he soon became aware of controlling his tone from mezzo forte upwards and played the big Schubert A minor in a masterly fashion.
Thalberg’s 1845 Erard
I have often found this sonata a bit long on the modern piano but today that was not the case due to his continual drive and the mellow but full cantabile that is not of the modern day pianos.
His performance of the Kalkbrenner variations on Chopin`s B flat mazurka was introduced in such an enticing manner.
A great charmer full of unique anecdotes and information
We were ready for a scintillating performance where the great difficulties passed unnoticed such was the charm and nonchalance with which he threw off the really extraordinary difficulties.
Just like Mark in this music they are pretty unique.
Neither look the part but does that matter when you can play like that.
An encore of a Kalkbrenner study op 143 n.13 played with such charm and subtle rubato I am sure his recording shortly to be issued will receive the same praise as Mark Viner’s are of Thalberg and Alkan.
The Price of Genius – Trifonov at the Barbican London
Interesting to note how the PR boys deal with Genius.
A programme full of Vogue model type fotos but in reality it was the same distracted genius of yore.
It cannot be easy to live with genius which is consuming you alive.
Such is Trifonov as he has been I imagine from his very early youth.
I remember meeting Trifonov at his 21st birthday party after he had just played Rachmaninov 1st Piano concerto at the Festival Hall on the same Fazioli piano that he used today.
The problem was that whilst at the rehearsal everything sounded well, with the notorious acoustic of the RFH the sound did not seem to reach into the crevaces of which there are many.
The audience were kept waiting whilst urgent discussions were in progress.
The concert of course was a great success but the audience at home got a better picture from listening on the radio than a lot of us got in the hall.
The same old Danil- a true genius ……..the PR boys have tried to smarten him up but they really have not understood that it is the contents not the container that counts
A beautiful private party afterwards where we were seated around a table of some 30 people.
Trifonov was very silent, quietly enjoying the party that his wonderful benefactress had arranged for him .
I was seated next to a man who was preparing a video about this young man long before he became world famous.
I seemed to recognise his voice although we had not been introduced.
It turned out to be Christopher Nupen who had made all those wonderful films years before about Ashkenazy,Barenboim,Jaqueline Dupre and many others in that truly golden era in London.
Our hostess announced that Danil had to leave early as he had to catch an early flight to his next destination.
I left at the same time together with Christopher and I just casually asked Danil what he thought of the piano.
Talk about a red rag to the bull.
He kept us in the street for two hours talking passionately about the piano and the music in a stream of breathless words with the passion of a man possessed.
He had been quietly waiting for an opportunity to talk about his passion,his life blood- Music.
I remember our hostess telling us off for keeping his taxi waiting and stopping him from getting an early night!
Christopher had written to our hostess to ask who I was “who was that man with a ‘shock ‘ of white hair “.
He was most amused when I quoted his words to him in an E mail correspondence later!
All this to say that it was the same Danil who appeared before us last night.
Crumpled suit ,towseled hair,tie skew- whiff – but his passion for music still intact.
He looked tired.
Consumed no doubt by his own passionate total dedication to music.
And it was the music that he shared with us last night.
Breathless,disordered,desperate,passionate.Genius does not always come lightly .
There is always the element of hit and miss in a constant voyage of discovery- of possibility.
Richter too had this superhuman self consuming talent that was ignited the moment he reached the keyboard.
He threw himself at the piano just as Trifonov did tonight.
Fou Ts’ong is the only other person I have met who was totally consumed and dedicated to music in this way.
He mused with himself in an almost private conversation in which it was the music not he that counted.
It is not always pleasant and can sometimes seem out of control and disorderly.
But as Gilels used to say about recording in comparison to live performance that it is the difference between canned or fresh food.
A programme that could have been played without a break such was his communion with the instrument once
he had arrived at its feet.
The Andante Favori led without a break into the Sonata op 31 n.3 .
It was a Beethoven both beautiful and bewitched.
It was a continual voyage of discovery which of course missed the very backbone of the work.
But what did it matter these were new eyes and ears searching desperately for the substance that was within.
It was not easy to accept – was Richter’s Appassionata?
But you could not take your eyes off it ‘s remarkable meanderings.
Bunte Blatter op 99 by Schumann were down as a selection but tonight he chose to play all twelve pieces .This too leading without a break into the Presto Passionato op 22.
It is interesting to note, and I am sure it is not just by chance, that the two rejected movements were included in tonight’s programme Andante Favori was to be the slow movement of the Waldstein Sonata as the Presto Passionatao was to be the final of the G minor Sonata.
Nothing is down to chance with a musician with such a searching mind.
The Bunte Blatter were both extremely beautiful and extremely dispersive.
The search was on and I must say on this occasion I did not think he had found the link that could bind these “Coloured Leaves” together.
Some wonderful subtle colouring and some gigantic plunges into an ocean of sound but some meandering without a strict sense of pulse and direction.
Talk about technical perfection or colour or sound is superfluous.This was a man who had thrown himself into the ocean and was swimming his way to survival.
Sink or swim indeed.
A first half that lasted almost 90 minutes !
He was not at all exhausted but we certainly were.
But then we are not superhuman.
After the interval came a remarkable performance of Prokofiev’s 8th Sonata.
It was as though the other works had been leading up to this performance.
I would have preferred a more sumptuous sound especially at the seductive opening. Gilels gave the first performance so I could just imagine that creamy rich sound.
More bite ,more edge ,more backbone .
But who am I to say.
This was a man creating the work afresh on the spot.
A work that Sviatoslav Richter described as a tree heavy with fruit.
Such sensous sounds and subtle colours not because he was seraching for them but because the music was speaking directly to him and he transmitting them to us.
Je joue,je ecoute je trasmet indeed.
The Vocalise was the single encore offered to an audience on their feet shouting for more.
He looked tired now and probably had not even realised himself the marathon that he had run this evening.
A unique artist.
Not always pleasant to listen to.
But someone who brings a breath of fresh air into what is fast becoming a rather artificial world of perfectly reproduced performances.
Like the piano in Steinways that you press a button and you can have any number of great pianists playing in your living room.
Press it again and it will repeat exactly the same.
Just a month later we were able to hear him in another of the great churches in the centre of London that dedicate themselves also to classical music :St Andrew Holborn.
Playing the great warhorse that Nikolai Rubinstein had declared worthless and unplayable.
Tchaikowsky deeply offended refused to change a note.
It was Hans von Bulow to whom Tchaikowsky dedicated the score and who gave the first performance in Boston in 1875 of a work that he described :” The ideas are so original,so noble,so powerful.The details so interesting;though there are many of them ,they do not impair the clearness and unity of the work .The form is mature,ripe,and distinguished in style.”
Bulow sent what is thought to be the first cable ever dispatched from Boston to Moscow telling Tchaikowsky of the concerto’s undisputed triumph with the Boston public.
The superb programme notes had me wanting to know more about this concerto that I have heard all my life.
From the very first performance with Jerome Rose at the Albert Hall on their Tchaikowsky nights to Rokas Valuntonis and Alice Sarah Ott’s performances this week.
Via such notable performances by Byron Janis,Artur Rubinstein,Beatrice Rana,Shura Cherkassky,Van Cliburn,Martha Argerich,Peter Katin,Yuja Wang but above all Clifford Curzon………………
The first performance of the original version took place on October 25, 1875, in Boston, conducted by Benjamin Johnson Lang and with Bülow as soloist. Bülow had initially engaged a different conductor, but they quarrelled, and Lang was brought in on short notice.
According to Alan Walker, the concerto was so popular that Bülow was obliged to repeat the Finale, a fact that Tchaikovsky found astonishing. Although the premiere was a success with the audience, the critics were not so impressed.
One wrote that the concerto was “hardly destined ..to become classical”.
Superb programme notes that had me searching for more information
George Whitefield Chadwick, who was in the audience, recalled in a memoir years later: “They had not rehearsed much and the trombones got in wrong in the ‘tutti’ in the middle of the first movement, whereupon Bülow sang out in a perfectly audible voice, The brass may go to hell“.(sic)
However, the work fared much better at its performance in New York City on November 22, under Leopold Damrosch.Benjamin Johnson Lang appeared as soloist in a complete performance of the concerto with the Boston Symphony Orchestra on February 20, 1885, under Wilhelm Gericke. Lang previously performed the first movement with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in March 1883, conducted by Georg Henschel, in a concert in Fitchburg, Massachusetts.
The Russian premiere took place on November 1/13, 1875 in Saint Petersburg, with the Russian pianist Gustav Kross and the Czech conductor Eduard Nápravník. In Tchaikovsky’s estimation, Kross reduced the work to “an atrocious cacophony”.
Rokas Valuntonis playing Tchaikowsky with Dario Peluso
The Moscow premiere took place on November 21/December 3, 1875, with Sergei Taneyev as soloist.
The conductor was none other than Nikolai Rubinstein, the same man who had comprehensively criticised the work less than a year earlier.
Rubinstein had come to see its merits, and he played the solo part many times throughout Europe. He even insisted that Tchaikovsky entrust the premiere of his Second Piano Concerto to him, and the composer would have done so had Rubinstein not died.
At that time, Tchaikovsky considered rededicating the work to Taneyev, who had performed it splendidly, but ultimately the dedication went to Bülow.
Tchaikovsky published the work in its original form, but in 1876 he happily accepted advice on improving the piano writing from German pianist Edward Dannreuther, who had given the London premiere of the work, and from Russian pianist Alexander Siloti several years later.
The solid chords played by the soloist at the opening of the concerto may in fact have been Siloti’s idea, as they appear in the first (1875) edition as rolled chords, somewhat extended by the addition of one or sometimes two notes which made them more inconvenient to play but without significantly altering the sound of the passage.
Various other slight simplifications were also incorporated into the published 1879 version. Further small revisions were undertaken for a new edition published in 1890.
The American pianist Malcolm Frager unearthed and performed the original version of the concerto and in 2015, Kirill Gerstein made the world premiere recording of the 1879 version. It received an ECHO Klassik award in the Concerto Recording of the Year category. Based on Tchaikovsky’s own conducting score from his last public concert, the new critical Urtext edition was published in 2015 by the Tchaikovsky Museum in Klin, tying in with Tchaikovsky’s 175th anniversary and marking 140 years since the concerto’s world premiere in Boston in 1875.
For the recording, Kirill Gerstein was granted special pre-publication access to the new Urtext edition.
Yuja Wang recently played this version too and Julian Trevelyan is playing this early version this same evening in St Albans
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Rokas chose to play the established 1890 version with this newly formed orchestra created in December 2012 by Dario Peluso and Celia Talbot.
LEO under Dario Peluso at St Andrew Holborn
Infact it is thanks to Celia Talbot that we were give an exemplary programme free of the usual empty PR tactics.
Both financial sector professionals they share a passion for the performing arts.
L ondon E uphonia O rchestra
– LEO is made up of a dedicated group of people from varied backgrounds:from full time musicians to students,doctors,lawyers,policemen,charity workers,bankers,teachers,scientists and journalists ,all with musical talent and passion in common.
Professor Bithell with Linn Rothstein
Dario as Rokas Valuntonis both receive guidance from Professor Peter Bithell who was present with Linn Rothstein to admire and encourage this new formation.
A very fine performance for Rokas Valuntonis on his first outing with this old warhorse.
Some beautiful things not least the wonderful sense of balance that allows the melodic line to shine through no matter what!
Professor Bithell in discussion with Dario Peluso
There were one of two moments where Rokas’s “liquidity of sound and devillish performance skill” managed to shine through thick and thin from one or two moments where the brass and woodwind were also at their virgin state with Tchaikowsky’s complex scoring.
There was no doubt about which edition was being used as the great chords rang out above some very radiant and expressive string playing.
Discussions with Linn Rothstein
Some truly superb playing especially in the cadenza where the bell like appearance of the melodic line was wonderfully realised.
The octaves of course were dispatched not only as a great virtuoso but also given a shape a direction that only a mature artist of stature could perceive.
The slow movement after some initial confusion from the orchestra was lit by the the magical sounds from the piano.
If the “devillish” playing of the prestissimo section caught the orchestra slightly off balance it was a small price to pay for the sheer beauty of shape and sound that they all brought to this moment of peace and simplicity.
Friends and colleagues celebrating after this ” first” performance of Tchaikowsky.
The Russian dance derived from a Ukranian melody in the last movement was played with great rhythmic energy leading to the majestic sweep and passionate outpouring for which this concerto has become the symbol of the great romantic concerto repertoire .
Discussussion with colleague Joon Yoon winner of the Guildhall Gold Medal last year
Jonathan Ferrucci in London for a recital supporting his friend and colleague from the Guildhall
ChristopherAxworthy-MusicCommentary 