Classical Music for Aficionados
I have the Sony boxed set of the Horowitz celebration CDs and at least once a week something from it is listened to. That Scarlatti disc of his is legendary and no wonder the playing is superhuman and if you look at him playing there is hardly a flicker from his face. I don't know about you people but I hate all this swaying and gesticulating on the piano stool. I went years ago to the Edinburgh Festival to see Mitsuko Uchida oops sorry ( Dame ) now. I could not look at her the faces and gesturing from her really put me off and I wasn't pleased because it was an all Schubert recital and at the time I had a few of her records but watching her I don't even know how she played that day because I was so off. Go back to earlier times and you had Horowitz , Richter, Arrau , Gilels and others who sat at the piano and the only thing you could see moving was their arms and hands and hardly a grimace from them and those men were superlative at technique as well . |
Having seizure like activity seems to be in style for a modern pianist. Matsuev reminds me of Gilels in that sense, minimal upper body movement. I totally agree with jim about Mitsuko, quite distasteful. As for Khatia Buniatishvili, I don't think she's even in the same universe with Matsuev. All these young Russian women get on stage half naked and get praised for their "technique". How about Lola Astanova? Nearly a million views on youtube. Check out this talent https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FdDLvED_4E |
