piano
Lugansky, Russian National Orchestra, Boreyko, Royal Albert HallThursday, 19 August 2010
Russians can often get away with murder in concert. It's so ingrained within our Western psyche to believe that the Slav has culture, musicality, an innate aesthetic sensitivity pouring out of every toe that you could get a Russian to do the chicken... Read more... |
PianomaniaMonday, 16 August 2010
Nobody can remember seeing a film about a piano tuner before. Happily, Pianomania isn’t merely unique; it’s a riveting documentary into the bargain. It takes as its subject the micro-detailed and nit-pickingly demanding routine of Stefan Knüpfer,... Read more... |
Aimard, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Nott, Royal Albert HallTuesday, 03 August 2010
It was a huge irony that the focus of last night's Proms programme was the musical duet: the concerto, the waltz, the visual-aural duet of a Ravel tone poem. For the one duet that really mattered - the dance of necessity between conductor, Jonathan... Read more... |
theartsdesk Q&A: Impresarios Victor and Lilian Hochhauser, Part 1Saturday, 31 July 2010
When the words "commercial" and "art" come together - as they do with the Bolshoi season currently at the Royal Opera House - odds are the glue between them is a three-word phrase "Victor Hochhauser presents". Victor and Lilian Hochhauser are the... Read more... |
Zacharias, BBC Philharmonic, Sinaisky, Royal Albert HallMonday, 26 July 2010
The Proms listings are full of concerts a bit like the one last night that seem to offer up, on paper, little of real burning interest: no big names, no star foreign orchestras, no intriguing rarities, no new works, nothing beyond one hard-working... Read more... |
Goerner, BBC Philharmonic, Sinaisky, Royal Albert HallSaturday, 24 July 2010
"Well, that's going straight onto my iPod!" declared my friend at the interval. Introduce anyone to Scriabin's lush Piano Concerto in F sharp minor - a real concert rarity - and the response is always the same: love at first sight. The tunes, the... Read more... |
Ivana Gavrić, Wigmore HallThursday, 15 July 2010
There are some recitals where you think only about the abstracted music - the harmonic arguments, the structural cleverness, the textural ingenuity - and there are others where you are forced to confront the presence of a set of living,... Read more... |
Chopin Unwrapped, Martino Tirimo, Kings PlaceWednesday, 14 July 2010
So most of us blinked and missed Martha Argerich gliding into Kings Place's Argentine celebrations last week. Yet here I am writing again about this liveliest of venues' Chopin marathon, and like a would-be Prommer who joins the last night party... Read more... |
Mikhail Pletnev charged with raping boyWednesday, 07 July 2010
One of the greatest pianists (and latterly conductors) of his generation, founder and artistic director of the Russian National Orchestra, Mikhail Pletnev, has been charged by Thai police with raping a 14-year-old boy, according to the BBC. Police... Read more... |
Philharmonia Orchestra, Temirkanov, Royal Festival HallFriday, 25 June 2010
Perhaps we'd better get the Prokofiev part of the opening concert out of the way first. I have a real problem with Russian whizz pianist of the moment Denis Matsuev. His iron-clad technique and heavyweight thunder still leave some room for... Read more... |
The Seckerson Tapes: Pianist Janina FialkowskaTuesday, 25 May 2010
Canadian-born pianist Janina Fialkowska has an extraordinary story to tell: she's battled cancer in the muscle of her left shoulder, endured ground-breaking muscle-replacement surgery, and even, in another bizarre twist of fate, had her work "stolen... Read more... |
Leonskaja, BBCSO, Bĕlohlávek, Barbican HallSunday, 09 May 2010
Fantasies in apparent freefall, though in fact ruthlessly organised and blindingly well executed, were the name of last night's game - an endgame, as it happened, to the BBC Symphony Orchestra's hardest-working Barbican season before the marathon of... Read more... |
