RARITIES
OF PIANO MUSIC
AT
SCHLOSS VOR HUSUM
CYPRIEN
KATSARIS Piano Recital
Friday
(28 August 2015)
Big shock and wonderful surprise of the
week: the Chinese pianist Wang Xiayin had cancelled on doctor's orders at the
eleventh hour. To replace her was the French-Cypriot pianist Cyprien Katsaris!
Some might even consider this an upgrade! No programme was planned, but one
would always rely on Katsaris to provide some impromptu prizes, which he would
announce on the spur of the moment.
He opened with his own improvisations on
popular 19th and early 20th century melodies, citing that
improvisation had already become a lost art among classical pianists. In his
15-minute montage, he brilliantly linked themes from Saint-Saens's Samson et
Dalila, Verdi's La Traviata, Wagner's Tannhauser, a waltz of
his own device, Tarrega's Memories of the Alhambra (his repeated note
technique imitating the guitar uncannily well), Tchaikovsky's Pathetique,
Khachaturian's Spartacus, Rachmaninov's 3rd and 2nd
Piano Concertos and Liszt's Les Preludes. This was better than any
of those Three Tenor medleys!
Late Liszt followed, the little-known
Trauervorspiel & Trauermarsch and Katsaris's own version of the
obsessive Csardas Obstinee, festooned with his own cadenzas and more
repeated-note mayhem. Katsaris then did
a Liszt by transcribing an aria from Liszt's early opera Don Sanche, in
the manner of the great master himself. The piece de resistance was
surely Katsaris's own arrangement combining both solo and orchestral parts of
Liszt's Second Piano Concerto, a blinder of a showpiece which has all
the tricks and treats of the ultimate virtuoso. Is Katsaris a reincarnation of
the great Hungarian? His generous and oversized spirit suggests the
affirmative.
A strange reversal of programming saw the
second half open with Haydn's little Sonata in C major, a breezily
conceived reading marred by a jarring metallic sound whenever he hit the low C
note. Apparently, a small object had fallen into the piano while shifting score
stand and lamp, rendering the Haydn an unscripted edition by Henry Cowell or
John Cage!
Schubert's second of Three Piano Pieces (D.946) showed
Katsaris an absolute master of cantabile, while Henry Purcell's Suite in
D major was a model of restraint and good taste. There was even time for a
quiz, winners of which got a Katsaris CD recording as a prize. A prelude of
Louis Vierne and a short song by
Friedrich Nietzsche were correctly identified by two young Germans. He
closed the programme with Louis Brassin's transcription of Wagner's Ride of
the Valkyries (Walkürenritt), of course with the usual Katsaris
modifications.
His sole encore was a nocturne that was
so famous that it is hardly ever played in recital, Chopin's ubiquitous Nocturne
in E flat major Op.9 No.2. A true rarity indeed, to be heard with Katsaris
discrete ornamentation and unfailing beauty of tone.
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