ANDRE SKALSKI

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18875, 30 May 1923, Page 4

ANDRE SKALSKI

FAMOUS POLISH PIANIST. Mr Andre Ska! ski, the distinguished Polish pianist, will give a season of piano recitals in Dunedin at tho Burns Hall, opening on Saturday next. Reporting on his opening recital in Wellington, the Evening Post said: “Mr S.kalski’s pianoforte recital in the Town Hall on Saturday night was a veritable triumph from the standpoint of art, music, and popularity. With no atYected airs and graces, with a demeanour remarkable for its modesty and confidence, ho made a deep and probably enduring impression on all who heard him play. During tho performance of a programme lasting two hours, there wag absolute attention, never a. movement to distract (ho rapt attention of tho audience, rarely the sound of a. repressiblo cough. The applause following number was vigorous and sincere. Mr Skalski appeared to establish the most intimate relations with bis hearers, as soon os he had played half a dozen bars of his opening work. ‘The Moonlight Sonata,' and the intimacy became closer and more personal as he proceeded. He played as one would play to responsive and _ understanding friends, and his audience listened in that, humour. His nerforniance leads one to believe that ho" has command of enormous power in one seemingly so slight, but there is nothing suggestive ot the sledgehammer. in Jiis treatment of the loudest and most forceful passages. Ho mu bo exceedingly gentle and tender when the occasion calls for their exercise. Full of poetry as he is, lie is always logical, and his work, no matter how difficult or elusive, reasonable and welldelinod. There is not the slightest trace ot a ' saccharin? quality in Ins handling of the most lovely and alluring massages of the ‘Chopin Fantasy and the ‘Melody’ of Rachmaninoff. The heights to which Wagner leads do not appal him. and ho is unafraid of the .supremo difficulties that Liszt has raised before all who would attempt, to rightly interpret hini.» Skalski’s personality is not suppressed, and ho is never wanting nr physical and mental energy. He craexs the toughest, of nuts that the masters have thrown to the pianists of nil time. In the Wagner number ho gave first a most entrancing and graphic description of the love storm that overtook and overwhelmed King Mark’s bride and her escort, the hapless victims of the potent love draught, arid in tho next- ho reconstructed as it were, the startling incident m .which a demi-god immures his daughter in flames that seemed to revel and dance and whirl, so dramatic was Skalski’s preseiitation of the episodes with ‘orchestral effects. A great artistic achievement. ’ ' . The box plans for tho recitals open at. (he Bristol Piano Company to-morrow 1 morning. ■