Live Concert Review: A Great Day for Chamber Music and a Recital too, Part I
By Mike Winter
The chamber music performances by Mariangela Vacatello, Evgheni Bozhanov, and Andrea Lam were stronger than the solo recitals (with the exception of Di Wu’s) by Ran Dank and Eduard Kunz. To top things off, the Takacs Quartet sounded better today too. Even the viola, in tonight’s sensational performance of the Dvorak Quintet with Andrea Lam, lost its edgy, nasal sound.
The day began with Ran Dank, who played the Foundation’s New York Steinway (my favorite…I wonder why it’s not chosen more often). The most successful part was at the beginning: Bach’s 4th partita. In the Preliminaries, Dank gave an extraordinary recital of Boulez, Beethoven, Scriabin, and Liszt (the “Reminiscences di Norma”), but Saturday after the Bach he played Prokoffiiev as if it were Liszt, and the Bates received what felt like a perfunctory reading, as in ”from the score.” I’ve never heard the Prokoffiev 6th sonata with so much pedal, and the fast tempi robbed the piece of drama and tension. The slow movement just rambled along, without Dank thinking about what he was doing; it got louder and softer and that was it. The Bach, on the other hand, received a thoughtful, even colorful performance. By color I’m referring to a large range of dynamic shading that illuminated his phrasing, which added interest to a well-conceived performance. But overall, Dank was better prepared for his preliminary recital.
Staying with the recitals, Eduard Kunz was also unable to live up to his preliminary standard, and he showed frustration at the conclusion of a wrong-note-plagued performance of Beethoven’s “Waldstein” Sonata and Rachmaninoff’s six Moments Musicaux (the first of which had a brief memory slip as well). But Kunz is a showman who enjoys an audience. He re-grouped to end the program with a head-bobbing, shoulder-swaying, finger-snapping (during the long rests) rendition of the Bates. The concert wasn’t all bad: the color and control and imagination and technique he showed in his mesmerizing prior recital (Five Scarlatti Sonatas, Haydn, Bach-Busoni, Bach-Siloti) did shine through much of today’s effort; the overall performance just wasn’t his best.
Di Wu, on the other hand, was fully prepared. Not a blemish appeared during Schumann’s “Davidsbundler Dances,” Clara Schumann’s mazurka that uses the same opening theme, Medtner’s “Fairy Tales, Op. 20″ (two pieces), the Hagen “Suite for Piano,” and Moszkowski’s “Caprice Espagnol.” Wu brought the house down with the Moszkowski showpiece (which I’d never heard), an ABA-form dazzler with a sultry waltz in the middle, but the shouts, and flowers, were equally deserved for every piece on the program. First though, you have to adjust to Wu’s sound; on the Hamburg it’s not a big sound, as in Kunz’ roaring Beethoven and Rachmaninoff on the same piano a few hours earlier. I described her sound as “recessed” during the Dvorak Quintet, thinking also it may be her way of blending with a chamber ensemble. But no, I think it’s just her tone production. She nevertheless has chosen the Rachmaninoff Third as one of her concerti for the finals, but she may be hard to hear if she gets to the finals.
May 31st, 2009 at 2:31 am
Thank you for a beautifully balanced review, looking at strengths and weaknesses in technique, style and interpretation.
I cannot play the piano to even good amateur standard, so it is not from the inside that I comment here - but some of the most wonderful experiences in my life have been to hear great instrumentalists and singers in the concert hall and opera house - like amazing recitals by Perahia, Pollini, Brendel, Pletnev, and recently Simon Trp?eski. It’s a totally gripping experience here to hear some of the performers who will go on to reach the same kind of level - or even perhaps greater, like some of those I know only from recordings. I have never before been able to listen to simply hours and hours of live piano playing across the whole repertoire, of international calibre as it happens, with huge differences in approach - with (for me) superb picture and stereo sound; and even be able to go back, almost immediately, and listen again to performances that affected me strongly (or catch one I missed).
I know I am only stating the obvious, and many people posting have taken time to praise all of the contestants or wonder at the technology that makes all this possible. But here in the middle of England, without ever having been near Texas or Japan, or China, I am seeing the worlds of classical music evolving before my eyes and ears, and can even express my feelings and ideas to others right across the world as it happens.
It was all the more extraordinary that telling someone at my work about all this, I mentioned Lukas Vondracek. He remembered the name and said he recalled him coming to my home town (pop. 30,000) eight years ago - which means he was only 14. There is an annual music festival in the summer, often with a Czech flavour because the Czech government in exile lived in the town in the Second World War and there are still many personal link. We don’t have a concert hall, just municipal buildings and churches for the festival. Yet Vondracek had lodged himself in my friend’s mind so vividly he recalled him years later. I was sad not to have seen him in the semi-finals, but there have been such great performances that it has not rankled. I hope people will be able to do the same in respect of Eduard Kunz, whether he goes into the finals or not - the more I read it, the more I feel pettiness and rancour are the very opposite of the emotional and intellectual transcendence to which all the competitors aspire.
Please forgive typos in the above.
May 31st, 2009 at 5:46 am
I agree with all that Chuce Borenz says about Mike Winter’s constructive and knowledgeable review. The standard of playing is magnificent and these young musicians so talented and committed to the music. It is a joy to listen to all of this live from Europe with the wonderful variety of interpretations and personalities involved. Cliburn should be proud of bringing them together for this marvellous competition and for enabling us to share it from all over the world.
May 31st, 2009 at 6:57 am
I believe you may have misread Di Wu’s final round performances. She has chosen the Beethoven 2nd Concerto and Rachmaninov 3rd Concerto for the final round.
May 31st, 2009 at 7:42 am
Eduard Kunz had his moments in the Waldstein, but I suspect he lets the pressure get to him.
You have to realize that everyone here is human after all. We place too much expectations on these young people to sound like Rudolf Serkin in Beethoven, George Cziffra in Liszt, Horowitz in Rachmaninoff, etc …. Getting nervous and anxious is real, and it affected even the great ones.
I nevertheless admire his determination throughout the entire recital, not just the Waldstein.
May 31st, 2009 at 10:22 am
It is wonderful that this is being streamed over the Internet so that anyone can watch, and if the VCPC is not the Olympics for piano, we probably have the Olympics to thank for perfecting the technology. Steve Cumming commented that they tried to do something similar in 2005 and it didn’t work out; this time, “we’re just doing it ourselves… This is the future of television.” I’m not sure how anyone makes money from this show (there are no ads). Maybe the Foundation is paying for it. However it’s happening. I’m delighted.
Several folks have commented that the sound in the hall is different than it is over the Web. True, no doubt, but when your online audience is N times larger than your in-hall audience, it has to change how you think about planning concerts. A few years ago, the SF Opera did a performance of Madama Butterfly to a full house of 3,000 people. But it was simulcast on a giant screen at the Civic Center Plaza, a block away, to 8,000+ people — and after the in-house curtain calls, they whisked the leads around to the stage at the Plaza for bows there, and the crowds went wild.
I’m enjoying not only the performances but also the rehearsals. You can learn a lot about the competitors by watching them rehearse. I know that the judges can’t take the rehearsals into consideration, but we can, as we decide which pianists are better musicians. At the Olympics, you are judged only by your performance at the moment, that dive into the pool. Here, we’re looking not only at the performance of the moment, but thinking about whether we want to hear more from these pianists in the future, as the jury says. In that sense, I’m happy; I’ve already found at least 12 pianists whom I’d like to hear in the future, and I wish them all luck.
May 31st, 2009 at 11:29 am
Actually, I believe that Eduard Kunz is the most beautiful musician. His sound is true, and he sounds as if he were in the music. However, alll the candidates are wonderfull, and the memory slips and such will probably hold him back from the finals.
May 31st, 2009 at 11:43 am
Question regarding White Lies for Lomax: who is Lomax, or what is Lomax ? Who is telling the white lies, and why ?
May 31st, 2009 at 12:10 pm
HO: Lomax is Alan Lomax, the American musicologist who recorded blues and folk musicians in the South during the 1930s and ’40s, hence the blues & jazz elements. Bates discusses the piece on the Cliburn website — click on his name in the “American Composers Invitational”
section.
May 31st, 2009 at 12:13 pm
Details on Bates and White Lies for Lomax are on the Web site, here:
http://www.cliburn.org/index.php?page=mason-bates
May 31st, 2009 at 12:26 pm
I would like to hear Kunz playing anyday. He has incredibly polished sound and unique musical ideas, which reflected in his Beethoven that had never been heard from others. I love almost everything he has played in this competition, solos or chamber, which I couldn’t say about any other competitors, except perhaps Bozhanov. I realized however an unique musician like him may not be anyone’s taste, but I hope jurors will notice that.