Nine pianists tackle Prokofiev sonatas at Angel Place
July 18, 2005
Last Saturday, Paul Carasco and eight of his pianist colleagues assembled at Angel Place, Sydney, to perform all nine of Prokofiev‘s challenging sonatas.
The nine musicians were Paul Carasco, Jayson Gillham, Alexey Yemstov, Benjamin Martin, Duncan Gifford, Simon Tedeschi, Maria Raspopova, Paul Carasco, Lance Coburn and Tamara Anna Cislowska.
David Vance’s review was generally approving of each performers’ aptitude and sense of passion, with only a couple where “the notes were there, but sadly not much of the music.”
Read the full review: Prokofiev piano sonatas
Buy music by Prokofiev at Amazon.
Cactus Pear Concert Review
July 16, 2005
The MySanAntonia web site has a concert review of the Cactus Pear Music Festival:
The folks who run the Cactus Pear Music Festival take pride in doing things a little differently from the norm.
The contrarian path led to unusually poised accounts of two chamber works from Beethoven’s middle period and an uncommonly expressive performance of his late song cycle “An die ferne Geliebte,” Thursday night in the well-filled Laurel Heights United Methodist Church.
The trend in Beethoven performance practice in recent years has been to pump up the bold contrasts and violent ejaculations, and to push the tempo. That histrionic style is fully justified by Beethoven’s scores and what we know of his personality, but it can obscure other qualities in his music.
Read the Online Exclusive review: Concert Review: Cactus Pear bends Beethoven in bold direction
Celebrate historical pianos’ 200th anniversary
June 3, 2005
When pianist Gayle Martin Henry first visited the Frederick Collection of Historical Grand Pianos last year, she was fascinated and a bit overwhelmed by the variety of tone colors and keyboard responses represented by these European instruments built between 1790 and 1907.
Gayle Martin Henry will return for a performance at 4 p.m. Sunday, June 5, at the Ashburnham Community Church, Main Street.
As sole American laureate of the sixth International Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in Moscow, the third American woman ever to reach the finals, Ms. Henry is not one to shrink from a challenge. She left the Frederick Collection yearning to play a concert on the beautiful 1805 piano by the London firm of Clementi & Co. What could be more appropriate than to celebrate the  piano’s 200th anniversary in 2005 with a recital of music by Haydn, Clementi and Field, all of whom had some connection to the instrument — First, however, she needed to learn a new kind of touch, eschewing arm weight in favor of lightly dropping the fingers into the keys, from arms suspended above the keyboard. Ms. Henry located owners of early piano replicas in her area, and arranged practice time to familiarize herself with this technique. Returning to the Frederick Collection last month to prepare for her June 5th concert, she was delighted to discover she no longer sounded like (in her words) “a galumphing elephant” when playing the delicate older pianos.
Link (SentinelandEnterprise.com)
Klass act to raise funds for cathedral
June 3, 2005
Myleene Klass is bringing her classical music talents to East Anglia for a debut concert in aid of Norwich’s Roman Catholic Cathedral.

Since her success on ITV’s Popstars and her time in Hear’Say, her solo album of piano music reached number two in the classical charts. She has now agreed to headline a concert in aid of the Cathedral’s development fund. 

Father David Ward, who has been a friend of the Klass family, from Gorleston, for almost 20 years, persuaded her to appear.
Link (EDP24.co.uk)
Pianist Camilo is a man of many sounds – Review
May 26, 2005
To paraphrase that common saying about the weather: If you don’t like what Michel Camilo is doing, just wait five minutes and surely, something different will come along.
During a long and varied performance as the closing act in this year’s Jazz at the Sheraton series, the dynamic pianist blended elements of classical, New Orleans, calypso, tango, Latin, ballad and even blues sounds between and within his intricate pieces, accompanied by bassist Charles Flores and drummer Dafnis Prieto, both from Cuba.
Camilo grabbed series co-founder Michael MacKay for a big embrace before he took the stage, starting off slow and thoughtful but quickly growing boisterous in the delightful New Orleans-infused “Cocowalk.”
Link (Salt Lake Tribune)
Rocco de Villiers in piano concert
May 26, 2005
Rocco is famous for his flamboyant style of piano playing. This is entertainment at it’s best. A modern pianist – in touch, in fashion, well dressed and well rehearsed.
De Villiers became a legend in his parents’ lounge when he was growing up, mixing drinks for their guests and then playing the piano. Later he became established as not only a performer, but also a producer, composer, conductor and director.
Link (SouthAfricanWine.co.za)
Library to showcase pianist
May 26, 2005
She’s only 17 years old, but pianist Rachel Naomi Kudo has already given recitals and concerto performances around the world. As part of Chopin Festival 2005, Kudo will perform at 7 p.m. Saturday at the Broward County Main Library, 100 S. Andrews Ave., Fort Lauderdale.
At age 16, Kudo performed Tchaikovsky’s Concerto No. 1 with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and played Falla’s Nights in the Gardens of Spain with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. She is a three-time scholarship recipient of the Miami-based Chopin Foundation of the United States.
The suburban Chicago teenager was most recently named second-prize winner at the Seventh National Chopin Competition of the United States, and she was also the youngest prizewinner. She was named a 2004 Davidson Fellow Laureate, a prestigious $50,000 scholarship award endowed by the Davidson Institute of Talent Development in Reno, Nev. She also won the 2003 Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Joseph and Bessie Feinberg Youth Auditions.
Link (SunSentinel.com)
George Winston to play Hiroshima’s A-bombed piano
May 26, 2005
Renowned pianist George Winston will play the grand piano that was repaired after having been damaged in the 1945 atomic bombing of Hiroshima at a concert to be held in the city.
Winston has had a strong interest in peace activities and the atomic bombing in Hiroshima. On his 1995 album, “Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes,” he took inspiration from the true story of Sadako Sasaki, an atomic-bomb victim who died of leukemia at the age of 12, in 1955.
The girl hoped for recovery right up until her death. She believed she would be cured by folding 1,000 paper cranes.
The piano, which was made in the early Taisho era (1912-1926), is extremely valuable. The piano was in a primary school about two kilometers from ground zero on Aug. 6, 1945. After the bombing, it was repaired and played a great role in nurturing musicians in the early days of the city’s Elizabeth University of Music.
Link (Daily Yomiuri Online)
Piano at its meditative peak: Andre Watts
May 18, 2005
In 1963, Andr?© Watts substituted at the last moment for Glenn Gould in a New York Philharmonic concert conducted by Leonard Bernstein. The vehicle was the high-octane Liszt E-flat Concerto, and Watts rose swiftly to national prominence and has remained there for the past 40 years.
While he has always been known more for the Romantic, bravura repertoire than his introspective side, Watts’ programs in recent years have been pointedly, even militantly, reticent, as was the case Saturday night at Tilles.
Link Newsday.com
Moby: Carling Academy, Glasgow
May 18, 2005
New York synth-pop geek Moby is well used to the slings and arrows of commercial fortune, while the listening public are well used to the peaks and troughs of his musical output. Since releasing every track off his advert-soundtracking international hit album Play as a single, there should be no excuse for fillers in his live set. And yet here he was, coasting along listlessly for distended portions of the show, promoting Hotel, his most insipid album yet.
Link (The Scotsman)
