The world-renowned Canadian pianist Marc-Andre Hamelin was in town last week to perform with the Singapore Symphony Orchestra in concerto and chamber music, his first visit here since 2012. No meet-and-greet or autograph session was arranged by the SSO, but a bunch of hopeful local pianophiles aggregated outside Victoria Concert Hall's stage door to get a glimpse of the super-virtuoso and possibly have a few words with him.
He soon emerged, and it was credit to the on-duty SSO staff that he was not straight away bundled into the limousine and rushed back to the hotel or airport. He thus had a chance to chat with those pianophiles, sign autographs and take photos. Many were armed with CD sleeves, and others with his piano scores (his Twelve Etudes published by C.F.Peters was a particular favourite) and other memorabilia. As obliging as always, he met with each and every person, and nobody was going home disappointing. Instead, they will be telling their friends here and overseas all about it.
For the record, Hamelin has come to Singapore on five occasions, first performing at the 4th Singapore International Piano Festival in 1997 (Beethoven & Liszt) and in concertos with the SSO in 2005 (Rachmaninov 3), 2008 (Mendelssohn 1), 2012 (Beethoven 4) and most recently 2026 (Brahms 2). All these are popular mainstream piano concertos. Can we even hope for the near future, performances of Nikolai Medtner concertos (any one of three, especially No.2) or dare we even dream, Busoni's Piano Concerto?
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