Richard Mapp praised

Press, 21 January 1983, Page 4

Richard Mapp praised

NZPA London The New Zealand pianist. Richard Mapp, received a glowing review from the “Financial Times" critic. David Murray, after his concert in London's Wigmore Hall this week. In what Murray called “a particularly attractive programme, substantial but not at all routine.” Mapp began with Clara Schumann’s “Variations on a Theme of Robert Schumann." He accorded them "not

only the quiet warmth and dignity which are their due. ..’but also an immaculate pedallegato that was an uncommon pleasure in itself.” said Murray. “More of the same good sense and full, balanced tone (bar the odd passage where Mapp's strong left hand shaded his right) informed Schumann’s own fantasy in C,” he said. “He did fine justice to its breadth, less to its sudden blazes, yet the expressive

power of the playing was real and mature, and even without the extra glint of spontaneity’ it made for an account of sterling character." Of the Christchurch-born Mapp's playing of the granados set of escenas romanticas, which “were rare and very welcome in a concert hall.” Murray said he "lavished sympathy and refined delicacy on it.” ~