Blackshaw recital

Press, 11 October 1985, Page 4

Blackshaw recital

Christian Blackshaw (piano), presented by Collins Lascelles Associates, at the Town Hall Auditorium, October 10, 8 p.m. Reviewed by Philip Norman.

With its line-up of virtuosic works and its highintensity playing, last evening’s concert was somewhat overwhelming. Up and down the emotional gamut the playing ran; each note struck, stroked, stretched, or shortened as part of a quest for heigthened musical meaning. Christian Blackshaw is a pianist of formidable talents. His technical agility is astonishing and his mastery of all shades of the dynamic spectrum complete. His interpretative powers are to say the least, imaginative and he is patently unafraid of emotion in its raw, naked state. With such an armoury of skills willingly unleashed on eacty piece, one might have

expected to be totally absorbed and affected by the music. In fact, particularly in the monumental Sonata in B minor by Liszt, the sounds were so highly coloured and overly detailed that they eventually lost much of their impact. How can you cap a thunderous fortissimo? Only silence is softer than the merest wisp of sound. In the Liszt, both extremes were touched with regularity. Admittedly, though, the effect of these was riveting in the initial stages. Schubert’s Piano Sonata in C minor was given the most satisfying treatment of the evening. The opening Allegro, in particular, carried arresting dramatic power, without the material being overstated. The inner Adagio was carried tenderly and a pleasing atmosphere was set. The Four Etudes by Peter Racine Fricker amount to

little more than gymnastic exercises for the digits. The florid configurations were articulated with ease and commendable clarity by Christian Blackshaw. A warm delivery of the second, slowest etude brought the happiest results. The programme opened with a novel interpretation of Bach’s Partita No. 1 in B flat Major. Phrasings were elongated to the point where each cadence, the harmony aside, sounded like the closing one. Final chords were sustained by the pedal for unnatural lengths, and the pulse ebbed and flowed to marked effect on the dance rhythms throughout. Yet, there were many fine features of the delivery. The clarity of line was excellent, the ornamentation crisp, and the dynamics neatly terraced. While I would not like to hear Bach always played in this maimer, it was, without a doubt, a sensitive and loving reading.