ANNA GENIUSHENE Piano Recital / TZE TOH Piano Recital / Review

 

BEGINNINGS & BRILLIANCE

ANNA GENIUSHENE Piano Recital

Victoria Concert Hall

Sunday (14 June 2026)

UMWELTEN

TZE TOH Piano Recital

Esplanade Black Room

Saturday (20 June 2026)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 23 June 2026 with the title "Anna Geniushene plays with youthful virtuosity; Tze Toh is alchemist of musical ideas".

Russian pianist Anna Geniushene, silver medallist at the 2022 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, was presented by Altenburg Arts in a recital which focused on the early works of Fryderyk Chopin and Johannes Brahms.

Photo: Ung Ruey Loon

Chopin was 14 when he composed his Opus 1 Rondo in C minor. Influenced by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Carl Maria von Weber and bel canto opera, the music can sound impossibly florid, but Geniushene brought out lyrical lines with a singing tone. For her, it was not just a showpiece but something more than that.

Photo: Ung Ruey Loon

Her views of Three Mazurkas (Op.50) and Three Waltzes (Op.34) saw generous use of rubato and extremes of dynamics. These contrasts gave the Ballade No.2 in F major (Op.38) an added edge of vehemence, while the rarely-heard Tarantella (Op.43) bounded with rumbling athleticism.

Photo: Ung Ruey Loon

Alfred Cortot’s lovely transcription of Brahms’ Wiegenlied (Lullaby, Op.49 No.4) separated two of the German romantic’s most dramatic piano works. The Scherzo in E flat minor (Op.4) bristled with rough and ready humour, while the First Sonata in C major (Op.1) from the 20-year-old was a tour de force of youthful exuberance and virtuosity.

Photo: Ung Ruey Loon

Its big opening chords referenced Beethoven’s monumental Hammerklavier Sonata, a reflection of young Brahms’ ambitions. The slow movement saw Geniushene evince genuine poetry before the final two movements swept the board with full-blooded passion. The Steinway grand more than withstood the pummelling, and this was where Geniushene directed her first of many bows.

Photo: Jeff Wong

While every note of Geniushene’s recital was scripted to the last detail, homegrown jazz pianist Tze Toh’s recital of orginal works was almost entirely improvised. Umwelten is the German word for environment, from the title of Baltic German biologist Johann von Uexkull’s book A Foray Into The Worlds of Animals and Humans.

Photo: Jeff Wong

This was his inspiration, with compositions likened to simple organisms which react to their environment and grow. In that respect, Anemone started with a modified Alberti bass (as heard in Mozart’s sonatas) over which simple minimalist variations were grafted on.

Photo: Pianomaniac

In Machines That Fly, after Leonardo da Vinci, tempo, volume and momentum were upped, reaching a feverish climax before closing quietly. Time was a work that felt timeless, a sequence of chords giving way to a Michel Legrand-like melody, which was allowed to drift in whatever direction Toh fancied and ending without actually resolving.

Photo: Jeff Wong

The regenerative ability of starfish was explored in A Star Is Reborn, where Carnatic scales heard in Indian ragas were exploited to quite magical effect. Sentio was described as a contemporary take on the ancient passacaglia where the right hand performed embellishments over a constant bass on the left hand. In truth, there was little separating Toh from J.S.Bach or Handel.

Photo: Jeff Wong

Here With Me reveled in Dave Grusin-like chords often heard in gospel music, totally in line with its description as a musical prayer. 12 Dimensions On Strings In Theory was given an impromptu premiere, a journey through twelve major and minor keys, where dodecaphony as practised by Arnold Schoenberg had never sounded so inviting.

75 minutes passed ever so quickly that Toh never got to perform all 12 works he had programmed, but he closed on a happy and upbeat note with Symphony (from Wanderers), where the dictum was to play as freely as possible. Toh is not just a jazz pianist, but an alchemist of musical ideas.

To hear more of the pianist as composer, transcriber and improviser, be sure to catch the six recitals of the 32nd Singapore International Piano Festival from 2 to 5 July at Victoria Concert Hall and The Arts House.

Singapore International Piano Festival | Singapore Symphony Orchestra

BEGINNINGS AND BRILLIANCE / ANNA GENIUSHENE Piano Recital / Review

 

BEGINNINGS AND BRILLIANCE

ANNA GENIUSHENE Piano Recital

Victoria Concert Hall

Sunday 14 June 2026

An edited version of this review was first published in Bachtrack.com on 15 June 2026 with the title "Anna Geniushene impresses Singapore audience with early Chopin and Brahms"

In 2022, Russian pianist Anna Geniushene was awarded the Silver Medal at the 16th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, second only to the prodigious 18-year-old Korean Yunchan Lim who attained overnight viral fame. Geniushene was 31 at the time and already a mature artist. Having heard both pianists in concert, one senses that Lim is still finding himself in the inevitable slew of concert and recording engagements, while Geniushene - with a steady career and family life - already knows exactly what she is all about.

Her second piano recital in Singapore (the previous in October 2023) was centred on early opuses and less-programmed pieces by Chopin and Brahms. Opening with Chopin’s Rondo in C minor (Op.1), a work of a 14-year-old, all the musical influences were on display – Mozart’s humour, Weber’s filigree and a love for bel canto. Its second subject in E major was where Geniushene stood out, with her phrasing and singing lines, amid the requisite prestidigitation and calisthenics. This was not some exercise to be whipped off in a showy display, but something far deeper.

Moving to mature Chopin, the three Mazurkas of Op.50 showed keen identification with the Polish dance idiom, with generous helpings of rubato along the way. The three Waltzes from Op.34 carry the adjective brillante, but this applied to the first and third dances, delivered with ebullience and vertiginous flourish. That left the central A minor, taken at a glacial pace as to induce somnolence and strain credulity. These extremes in dynamics carried into Ballade No.2 in F major (Op.38), where gentle sicilienne-rhythm meets headlong with violence. These stark contrasts made the tumultuous coda all the more exciting. The Tarantella in A flat major (Op.43) closed the first half with rumbling athleticism, without the twinkle-toe lightness or inner voices of Arrau or Cherkassky.

Geniushene was even more convincing in the music of Brahms. Jokes and punchlines of the early Scherzo in E flat minor (Op.4) were delivered with much immediacy, manifested in abrupt and clipped phrases, answered by hectoring octaves of authority. Those familiar with Hong Kong movies will recognise this as music that accompanied the Classification III (Adults only) comedy Vulgaria from 2012. Don’t ask. To assuage the final deluge of notes to come, Alfred Cortot’s tender transcription of the familiar Wiegenlied (Lullaby, Op.49 No.4) was most lovingly delivered, as only a mother (or father) of two could.

Brahms’ Sonata No.1 in C major (Op.1) was the ambitious outpourings of a 20-year-old. Its opening salvoes of big chords recalled Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata and Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy. Geniushene has the physical heft, mental endurance and innate musicality to do justice to this overwrought music, and scarcely missing a note while at it. The slow song-like second movement, most sensitively voiced, provided much-needed respite before the unrelenting onslaught of the final two movements. The tempo was upped to terminal velocity and volume, a wonder how an instrument could withstand such pummelling. Victoria Concert Hall’s Steinway D more than did so, and it was in its direction that Geniushene gave her first bow, before acknowledging audience applause.

Her encore of Leonid Desyatnikov’s silky Waltz in Honour of Charles Dickens was class and sophistication, while Shostakovich’s Polka from The Age of Gold, pure farce. She referenced an ongoing football tournament, held in a crooked capitalist state with corrupt and cowardly politicians. Sounds familiar, anybody?

Star Rating: ****

Anna Geniushene was presented by Altenburg Arts.

Professional photography by Ung Ruey Loon

Some concert-goers
always come prepared!

The edited review on Bachtrack.com 

can be found here:

Anna Geniushene impresses Singapore in early Chopin and Brahms | Bachtrack

A PIANO RECITAL NOT TO MISS: ANNA GENIUSHENE on 14 June 2026

Here is a piano recital not to miss! Presented by Altenburg Arts, Berlin-based Russian pianist Anna Geniushene makes a welcome return to perform a recital of works by Fryderyk Chopin and Johannes Brahms. Silver medallist in the 2022 Van Cliburn International Competition, she brings with her a wealth of virtuosity and musicality in her interpretations. Her debut recital here in October 2023 received a rapturous review in The Straits Times.

Programme:

CHOPIN Rondo in C minor, Op.1

CHOPIN Mazurkas, Op.50

CHOPIN Waltzes, Op.34

CHOPIN Ballade No.2, Op.38

CHOPIN Tarantella, Op.43

BRAHMS Scherzo, Op.4

BRAHMS-CORTOT Lullaby, Op.40 No.4

BRAHMS Sonata No.1 in C major, Op.1

ANNA GENIUSHENE Piano Recital

Victoria Concert Hall

Sunday 14 June 2026, 5 pm

Tickets available at SISTIC:

Beginnings & Brilliance • Anna Geniushene — Piano Recital

ANNA GENIUSHENE

is presented by Altenburg Arts

A PIANO RECITAL NOT TO MISS: ANNA GENIUSHENE on Friday 6 October 2023

Here is a piano recital not to be missed!

Russian pianist ANNA GENIUSHENE received worldwide plaudits for her performances at the 2022 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition when she was awarded the Silver Medal. Her Singapore debut, presented by Altenburg Arts, showcases consummate artistry in a wide range of piano music.

The programme:

TCHAIKOVSKY Two Pieces, Op.1

WEINBERG Wiegenlied, Op.1

CHOPIN Rondo in C minor, Op.1

SCHUMANN Abegg Variations, Op.1

PROKOFIEV Piano Sonata No.5 (revised edition)

RACHMANINOV Etudes-Tableaux, Op.33

Victoria Concert Hall

Friday 6 October 2023, 8.15 pm

Tickets available at SISTIC:

Piano Recital by Anna Geniushene [G] (sistic.com.sg)

First watch this marvellous video:

Backstage@Cliburn 2022 — Episode 4: Anna Geniushene (Silver) - YouTube