Tuesday 12th June 2007
Barbican Hall
Chopin Prelude in C-sharp minor, Op. 45
Chopin Ballade No. 2 in F major, Op. 38
Chopin Two Nocturnes, Op. 27 (No. 1 in C-sharp minor; No. 2 in D-flat major)
Chopin Scherzo No. 3 in C-sharp minor, Op. 39
Chopin Polonaise in A-flat major, Op. 53
Liszt Nuages gris
Liszt Unstern
Liszt La lugubre gondola No. 1
Liszt R.W. - Venezia
Liszt Sonata in B minor
It has been almost a year since the last full scale piano recital that I saw. To be fair, there are plenty of decent recitals around, but most of the time they play works Chopin, Liszt and Rachmaninov which, really, can be a bit dry. (Still appreciate them, just a bit dry.) Maurizio Pollini has been one of my favourite pianists of all time and I have always wanted to see him live. Winner of the 1960 Warsaw Chopin Competition, he is one of the most important musicians around and has the reputation of putting some of the most curious programmes like Chopin against Stockhausen or Liszt against Nono so I did expect to see him playing Schoenberg (Suite, Op. 25), Berg (Sonata Op. 1) and Webern (Variations, Op. 27), not to mention Boulez Sonata No. 2, which he championed. Well, none of them were played, and it was an all-Chopin and Liszt programme, starting with several Chopin gems and concluding with the meaty B minor Sonata by Liszt.
It was my first time to the Barbican Hall so I am not too familiar with the acoustics. Sitting at the back of the middle section, the sound was fairly solid, with the inevitable feeling of being quite distant (both aurally and visually) from the performer. Still, it was quite amazing to see Pollini live.
Pollini started off gently with Chopin's C-sharp minor Prelude (Op. 45) which was pretty sweet. Both this and the two Op. 27 Nocturnes a while later were magically phrased, with much polished delicacy (no pun intended) and support. Sandwiched between them was Ballade No. 2, the one with the barcarolle opening. He started it off at a rather fast tempo, making the Presto con fuoco section seem indifferent to the preceding opening, which was a bit awkward. It is a terribly difficult piece, and Pollini (unusually) showed signs of struggle at the demanding places in the presto bit and in the conclusion. It sounded blurry and rushed at times as well. Scherzo No. 3 and the popular Polonaise in A flat major (Op. 53), on the other hand, were quite amazing. The technical flair he was able to demonstrate was simply jaw-dropping, and the sense of rhythm in both action-packed pieces was top-notch. I start to understand why he is one of the very few people on Earth who can play Bartok's Second Piano Concerto live. The only disappointment, however, was that the piano was slightly out of tune and it buzzed quite a lot. Whilst one might be able to get away with it in the preludes and nocturnes, it was just too distracting when it buzzes every time Pollini hits a note in the lower register of the keyboard, given the ostinato in the polonaise. The problem persists in this concert, and was even more annoying in the upcoming Liszt Sonata.
Immediately after the interval, Pollini played four short late works by Liszt, which were Nuages gris, Unstern, La lugubre gondola No. 1 and R.W. - Venezia. They are fairly atypical works by Liszt, which he wrote in view of death and are very dark, and very adventurous in tonal language. (For example, in the Nuages gris, there is a passage of chromaticism against whole-tone scale) Pollini played them with much emotional attachment (I hope this is not prophetic) and great sense of bleakness and despair. It was some painful and intense 15 minutes of soul confinement, which was to be disturbed, somewhat anti-climactically, by the hopeful entrance of the B minor Sonata, one of Liszt's most celebrated masterpieces. It is huge in construction. This is one big mountain to climb for any professional pianist. From the great distance, Pollini seemed to pull it off completely effortlessly, something which I am quite jealous of. He made all the tiny and frequent hammering looked like a walk in the park. It was expectedly great, but I was still surprised by how great it was - thirty minutes of fantastic pianism. But again, with all the passages in the lower register in the exposition and later in the recapitulation, the piano was very annoying. I hate to say, but it destroyed the mood, no matter how great Pollini was.
As much as I wanted a Schoenberg or Webern encore, he played Debussy's "La Cathedrale engloutie" Prelude (slight change of mood) to great applause, which was followed by Chopin's Revolutionary Etude which was always fun to see, and, after much request, Chopin's Ballade No. 1, which was another great demonstration of his technical mastery. More than half of the hall gave him standing ovation afterwards.
It was a wonderful concert, with the exception of the piano being very dodgy. It was a shame I could not get an autograph from / photo with him this time, but I would definitely go and see him again, if I'd ever have a chance, hopefully with a bit of Pierre Boulez. He is doing a Nono concert (...sofferte onde serene...) at the RFH in October...
This entry is adopted from an earlier blog of mine, which no longer exists.
