Sunday, August 29

Notes on a recording

A couple of weeks ago I made a recording of Rachmaninoff's Moment Musical in E Minor. I had played the piece a couple of times in the past and I always wanted to have a recorded version of it. It' s a hard piece, one that requires concentration and stamina to keep going till the end - the final explosion. This is typical early Rachmaninoff - the Moments Musicaux are, in my view, one of the best products of his youth. The E minor one is the best known piece of the set, and understandably so: apart from the technical bravura, one can discern a fine melodic line which never falls victim to the repetetitive structure of the piece. It is a desperately passionate melody, with a short lyric interlude around the middle, which expands till the last fff. I think the danger of this music is to play too loud too early; one must keep the sound well under control, otherwise the catastrophe is unavoidable!
As for the recording procedure. Of course, due to the video camera, no edit could be done - I had to play non-stop from the beggining to the end. I managed to perform the piece 4-5 times and it was pretty exhausting. We kept three takes and at a later stage, I decided which one was to be uploaded. The studio is one of the best in Athens and the Yamaha is well beyond average.

It was good fun! And the result is, I think, more or less, decent, although there are many annoying details... A few technical mistakes, and a general sense of sluggishness; is it not a bit boring too? But anyway, there we are, here it is and all comments are welcome!





Wednesday, August 18

Today's listening: Lugansky playing Brahms

Today’s listening: Nikolai Lugansky, a live recital given in August 2002. Brahms, Klavierstucke op. 118. Wonderful performance as ever, full of life, and within the spirit of the composer. Did not particularly warm to his rendering of the final intermezzo though – I found that there was something missing of the profound sadness and depth which penetrates this intensely personal moment of late Brahms.

I remember playing this particular Intermezzo (op.118 no 6) for my diploma exams, back in 1997. It was such a difficult thing to bring out the feeling of loneliness and desolation that is expressed in the melodic line. I played it then (cannot remember how it went) and never attempted to tackle it again. I think it’s one of these pieces that persuade me that the piano is undoubtedly the most difficult instrument of all. To bring out correctly the melody of op.118/6 from a massive ‘piece of furniture’ (I mean the piano) that faces you, seems to me enough to prove the statement.

Thursday, August 12

on depression...

Well, it can be depressing…

Argerich’s performance of Schumann’s Kinderszenen (the piece I am working on currently) is so impossibly perfect, so unapproachably beautiful that one becomes depressed thinking of one’s own imperfectness, one’s hopeless distance from such an immaculate sound. It’s an odd feeling, similar to the one felt when reading the life of saints.

And this brings to my mind a novel I read ages ago: the title was “The Loser”, and it was written by the Austrian writer Thomas Bernhard. It’s the story of a pianist who, after hearing Glenn Gould playing, gave up the piano, and some years later, still crushed by the comparison between his playing and the great pianist’s, died while listening to Gould’s Goldberg Variations. It is not the happiest story (!), (and the narrative is a bit complicated), yet one can understand the principal idea – how profoundly wrong this feeling of depression-deriving-from-comparison can be.
…And yet, it’s only too natural to feel like that when persons from one’s own professional field do so much better than oneself! I think the challenge here is to try to transform this negative feeling into something positive; how can one do that? Well, I think one could begin by focusing on his/her own uniqueness. Every person is unique – and so is every smile, every gaze, every soul. The realization of our otherness is crucial; for it can enable us to see this very element in the other person too; so, yes, for instance, I will never be able to play Kinderszenen as well as Martha – no matter if I practice for hours and hours on end. But how sweet it is to rejoice at this great gift given to her by God, how sweet it is to rejoice for the gifts that are bestowed on my life – my talents, my own playing, my life, my family.
The aim, as I understand and feel it, is to be able to reach a point of heartful thankfulness to God for everything that occurs, for everyone that one may come across in life.

I write this in our summerhouse, in a village near Corinth, Greece. What ideal surroundings for such a beautiful piece of music - and a performance to match…