FREDDY KEMPF LIVE IN SINGAPORE / Review

FREDDY KEMPF LIVE IN SINGAPORE

Esplanade Concert Hall

Wednesday (1 August 2018)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 6 August 2018 with the title "An agile journey through the geography of piano etudes".

The etude or study is a short piece written to train digital and motor technique, thus honing agility in students of the instrument. Piano etudes have often struck fear and dread, especially those dry and didactic finger-twisters by Czerny and Hanon which barely pass as listenable music.

British pianist Freddy Kempf served up a coup with a recital of 24 etudes, but fortunately those written by Chopin, Rachmaninov and living Ukrainian composer Nikolai Kapustin. Quite uncharacteristically, he opened with three Concert Études from Op.40 by Kapustin, jazz-inspired numbers which are usually performed as encores.

Getting off to a thunderous start, he immediately had listeners audience eating from his hands. The central Étude No.7, entitled Intermezzo, opened with smoky and night-clubby insouciance before working to a tipsied frenzy that was hard not to wholeheartedly applaud at its conclusion.

That was exactly what the audience did, clapping through short breaks between the 12 Études Op.10 by Frederic Chopin, mostly after those which ended with a big bang. One wondered whether Kempf was distracted by the inappropriately timed and intrusive accolade, but he more than held his nerve.

Scintillating bravura was the order of the day, beginning with the wide arpeggio stretches in the C major Étude (No.1) and concluding with the coruscating passion of the C minor “Revolutionary” Étude (No.12). In between, his razor-keen reflexes and hyper-acute synapses fired, tossing off such treacherous pieces like the A minor “Chromatic Étude” (No.2) and G flat major “Black Key” Étude (No.5) without so much as breaking a sweat.

There was none of that mindless playing-by-the-numbers pianism so often encountered in keyboard automatons churned out by the dozen. Instead these were very nuanced readings, where purring pianissimos and furious fortissimos were mixed in with deliciously timed rubatos, that inimitable soul of musical Romanticism.

Kempf's performances of the 9 Études-Tableaux Op.39 by Rachmaninov that followed after the interval were arguably even better. Moving away from mere virtuoso display, these are little tone poems which seem to tell stories from deep within the Russian soul. The first two were obsessed with the Dies Irae (the medieval plainchant of Judgement Day), first angry rumbling followed by calming placidity.

Then there was that astonishing sequence of etudes that relived bells of all nature and kind. The E flat minor (No.5) tolling variety was vividly contrasted with the heavier-laden pealing in C minor (No.7). In between was wild scampering in A minor (No.6), which listeners will be readily reminded of Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf.

Gentle swirling eddies in D minor (No.8) soon gave way for the triumphal procession in D major (No.9), where a marching band's parade closed with a thrilling and sonorous carillon. Kempf's journey through the geography of piano etudes had come to an end, and there was one encore. That was a complete antithesis to the mighty study: Chopin's simple little waltz called L'Adieu, or Farewell.  

    

Freddy Kempf's piano recital was presented as part of the Aureus Great Artists Series.

A PIANO RECITAL NOT TO BE MISSED: FREDDY KEMPF LIVE IN SINGAPORE

The prize-winning British pianist Freddy Kempf makes a long-awaited return to Singapore with a piano recital at Esplanade Concert Hall on Wednesday 1 August 2018. Kempf was brought to world attention at the 1998 Tchaikovsky International Piano Competition, when he was awarded the 3rd Prize. 

In a cause celebré rivalling Ivo Pogorelich's at the 1980 Chopin Competition, the Russian audience and many critics had been scandalised as they felt he was denied the rightful gold medal. His subsequent career has been nothing less than meteoric with international performances and highly rated CD recordings on the BIS label.

His recital on 1 August is unusual as it comprises wholly of concert etudes, a reminder of his prodigious technique displayed at his 2001 Singapore debut when he performed four of Liszt's Transcendental Etudes at the Singapore International Piano Festival.    

Programme:

KAPUSTIN Concert Études, Op.40 Nos.1,7 & 8

CHOPIN 12 Études, Op.10

RACHMANINOV 9 Études-tableaux, Op.39

Wednesday, 1 August 2018 at 7.30 pm

Esplanade Concert Hall

Tickets available at all SISTIC outlets

or Book online at:

https://www.sistic.com.sg/events/cfreddy0818

Freddy Kempf Live in Singapore is presented as part of the Aureus Great Artists Series.

CD Reviews (The Straits Times, December 2011)

A DOUBLE LIFE
LOKE HOE KIT, Cellos
NICHOLAS LOH, Piano
****

This might very well be the very first CD recording from a Singaporean cellist. Loke Hoe Kit, just 23 years old, was a student of the American cellist Nathaniel Rosen who in turn was mentored by the great Russian Gregor Piatigorsky. It is this illustrious lineage that inspired this disc of works for two cellos. Gian Carlo Menotti, better known for his operas, had written his Suite for two cellos (1973) for Piatigorsky. It is a pleasant neo-baroque work in four movements that makes a good companion for the Sonata for two cellos attributed to Handel.

Following the example of the great Jascha Heifetz (who himself was a famous collaborator with Piatigorsky), Loke performed and recorded both parts in both works, achieved by overdubbing. He has genteel and cultivated sound, coaxed from a 1987 Clifford Roberts cello once owned by Rosen. Pianist Nicholas Loh is a sensitive accompanist for this short but pleasant album, which at under 30 minutes plays like a CD single. There are at least seven quirky photos of the self-styled fashionista in Loke. One could do worse than to support local talent and innovation.

This CD is available at the Esplanade Shop and all Gramophone outlets.

CHOPIN Piano Recital
INGOLF WUNDER, Piano
Deutsche Grammophon 477 9634
***1/2

Although it was the Russian Yulianna Avdeeva who won First Prize at the 2010 Chopin International Piano Competition, it was joint runner-up Ingolf Wunder from Austria who trumped the coveted recording contract with the German yellow label. Much of this “artistic triumph” is played up in a rather self-absorbed interview article in place of sleeve notes, but what is his playing like?

Thankfully he is no Ivo Pogorelich, the controversial Serb who “lost” in the 1980 competition. As expected, the performances are well-turned and tasteful, with the best readings going to the Andante Spianato & Grande Polonaise (Op.22) and Polonaise-Fantasie (Op.61), the latter which won him the special Best Polonaise Prize. However in the Fourth Ballade and Third Sonata, he is curiously stolid. When there are opportunities to soar and go for broke, he remains too unruffled and ultimately earthbound. Perhaps his Teutonic sensibilities dictated that the heart be ruled by the brain. One goes to Argerich, Zimerman, or even Lang Lang and Li Yundi, for more sparks.

FREDDY KEMPF Piano Recital
BIS SACD-1810 / ****1/2

British pianist Freddy Kempf, of German-Japanese descent, has recorded extensively for much of his career, ever since the controversy of not being awarded First Prize at the 1998 Tchaikovsky International Piano Competition. Now in his early thirties, he has lost none of the youthful exuberance that made him so popular. In this well-balanced recital of virtuoso works, a fiery disposition is evident in Rachmaninov’s Corelli Variations, based on the baroque theme La Folia. At 15 minutes, his account of Stravinsky’s Three Movements from Petrushka is one of the swiftest off the block. It is exciting, stunningly accurate, yet does not stint on the details.

The mark of an artist’s maturity may be discerned in the Bach-Busoni Chaconne. Here, Kempf’s acute sense of its breadth and architecture is allied by a grandstanding approach that is quite breathtaking. In the eight linked dances of Ravel’s Valses nobles et sentimentales, a flexible view of its chameleonic swings in pacing and dynamics add to the character of the interpretation of this elusive work. With this recital disc, Kempf is seen to have transcended his prodigy years to become a true artist.