FERNANDO LAIRES

Press, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 26510, 27 August 1951, Page 3

FERNANDO LAIRES

A FINE PIANIST There are two matters for regret about the visit of Fernando Laires. The first is that he should have come here at a time when it is difficult to assemble a large audience, and the second is that his recital will not be followed by four or five more. Musicians all over the world at present mourn the death of Artur Scnnabel, one of the very greatest pianists in Europe. It was, therefore, a reassuring thing to hear a young European pianist, who would not claim yet to have reached Schnabel’s eminence. but whose outstanding talents and musicianly qualities show that he is capable of carrying on the great traditions of the master pianists. Mr Laires is now. at toe age of 26 years, a professor of the pianoforte m the national conservatorium of his birthplace. Lisbon. This is a high post for such a young man, but one feels strongly, after hearing him play, that Lisbon is lucky. Although he is of h In this programme he did hov wander far from the well-trodden pathways in choice of items. Nevertheless he invested all his work with a refreshing charm of interpretation. Each work was given a personal reading full of imagination and poetic insight, yet there was nothing foreign to the intrinsic character of the music. It was all dene with a natural and unassuming manner, no calling of attention to himself, and with an unmistakeable clarity of meaning. Bach’s Toccata in D—a suite —is not often heard. In the opening there was clear differentiation in the antiphonal passages which would originally have been played upon different manuals of a harpsichord. Here was heard the clear and" sharply defined playing which promised well, for a really enjoyable recital. Following this, came passages which showed Mr Laires’s powers of imaginative nuance in cantabile Playing, and the final gigue had crisp vitality and a joyous forward driving rhythm. There was a moving bending of the rhythm in the Grave sections of the first movement of Beethoven s C minor Sonata and the Allegro con brio sections and the Finale were played with exciting tone and fine control of phrasing and .dynamics. The middle movement had deep feeling without sentimentality. Schubert's Impromptu in B flat found 'in Mr Laires a most sympathetic interpreter, and in the Mephisto Waltz by Lwrt there was all the dramatic intensity that one could desire. Schumann’s Carnaval, unless it be exceptionally well played, can be an intolerable bore: but there was not a dull moment in one of the most poetic and faithful renderings which one can remember hearing for a very long an interpreter of Chopin Mr Laires has exceptional gifts. The restfulness and delicate filigree of the Berceuse was well contrasted by the spirit of the Mazurka in D major. There would have been more angry fire in the Revolutionary study had the left hand figuration been clearer. The Waltz in C sharp minor was quite power and spaciousness of renderings of Backhaus. Moiseiwitch, or Solomon, but it was played in a dramatic, logical and bravura style.