Yekwon Sunwoo won the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition on Saturday, besting 29 rivals over two weeks of playing to become the prestigious contest’s first champion from South Korea. The Cliburn, held every four years in Fort Worth, was founded in 1962 by Van Cliburn, the American pianist who stunned the world by winning the Tchaikovsky competition in Moscow in 1958, at the height of the Cold War.
A day after my valued colleague and friend Harry Rolnick posted his review of the concert given by the New York Philharmonic conducted by Alan Gilbert with the participation of pianist Emanuel Ax, I was able to attend the second performance of that program and at the same time I was also able to conduct an interview with this esteemed soloist who, during these subscription concerts, gave the world premiere of the Piano Concerto by Austrian composer HK Gruber.
Emanuel Ax is notoriously nice — one of the kindest, funniest, genuinely caring people in the business. And, although he is 40 years into a career as one of the world’s greatest pianists, both as a soloist and a chamber musician, and although, at 65, he’s still inarguably at the top of his game, he maintains a completely genuine sense of modesty, humility, and respect for the hard work, and the great fun, of making music.
Describing a pianist’s performance as unhinged might seem like an unlikely compliment. But the adjective could be applied in the most flattering terms to Emanuel Ax’s engrossing interpretation of Beethoven’s “Pathétique”Sonata on Wednesday evening at Carnegie Hall. The sonata was included on an all-Beethoven lineup, with two popular sonatas bookending three lesser-known pieces. Mr. Ax brought demonic power to the “Pathétique,” which opened the program.
"I still can't believe what is happening to me this evening. It's like a dream come true," Gorini told DW in an interview. The soloist had exhibited a dreamlike confidence in his rendition of Ludwig van Beethoven's "Emperor Concerto." From the first notes, it was clear to this reporter: he's the one.
The addition, which gave the telecom Competition Prize winner Filippo Gorini in the Beethoven-night was breathtaking. The octaves and chords, which he hammered into the keyboard in the first movement of Bartók's Piano Sonata in 1926 with high speed and absolutely accurate, showed a virtuoso who his is sure.
Beethoven’s massive and confounding Diabelli Variations isn’t the obvious choice for a debut disc, but the young Italian pianist Filippo Gorini seems intently drawn to the strange drama of this martial little tune and its mysterious decorations. When heard him playing it, he invited Gorini to study with him, and you can hear why. Gorini has a fearless attack in heftier variations and an inquisitive, ultra-focused touch as the themes start to splinter and turn inward.
A Google search for scores written for one hand alone reveals a considerable repertory for each hand. The best-known works are for the left hand, like the concertos by Ravel and Korngold, composed for the pianist Paul Wittgenstein, who lost his right arm in World War I. Injury is often a motivating factor behind such compositions; Scriabin wrote for left hand after an injury to his right. Brahms dedicated his transcription for left hand of the Chaconne in D minor (from Bach’s Partita in D minor for solo violin) to Clara Schumann, who had injured her other hand.
Listening to the pianist Jeremy Denk play, you never doubt that he is someone who thinks about music deeply and rather a lot. It’s not that you sense that he fusses overmuch about tempos and dynamics, or that he’s out to demonstrate his awesome cleverness through programming juxtapositions. Rather, what Mr. Denk’s playing conveys most is an inclusive consideration of where each piece came from, what it reflects about its composer and how music connects to a life’s broader concerns.
Denk played the “Goldberg Variations” with an insouciant charm, and also with the sense that every note had been carefully considered: the attack, the separation or the fluid legato of each phrase, the nature of each articulation, the different character of each variation, the tricky crossing of hands, the variety in dynamics. Ornamentation was sparing but effective.
