Let's go to "Casa da Musica"!

Piano recital of EMANUEL AX: Porto, Casa da Musica, 15. 5. 2010

Beethoven: Sonata in C-major, op. 2, no. 3
---> Unforgettable, I understood every tone. What a differentiation in sound, what a clear structure and how much magical moments. And oh, that Beethoven! Bravo!

Kaija Saariaho: Ballade (for Manny)
---> what he did with this ballad is really nice.

Beethoven: Sonata in E-flat major, Op. 81a "Les Adieux"
---> Copying comment of the first sonata ... Bravo!

Chopin: Polonaise-Fantasie in A-flat major, Op. 61 --->
Good, understanadble, with magic, yet, Chopin would need a bit of another dimension of sound, for example some briliance.

Chopin: 3 Mazurkas
E-minor, Op. 41 No. 1 ---> I miss dancing, double stylisation,
C-major, op.21 No. 3 ---> Nice, some additional clarity in
ornamentation wouldn't do harm,
C-minor, Op. 56 No. 3 ---> Very stylized mazurka, but still ...

Thomas Ades: Three Mazurkas, Op. 27
---> Beautiful mazurkas, with obvious Chopinian impact, but still in their own language. Exploiting the extreme possibilites of piano. Very nice.

Chopin: Scherzo No. 2 in b-flat minor, Op. 31
---> Really well. Everything in its place, only that brilliance at certain points... it could be the issue of pianism ...

An exceptional musician, this Ax! I highly recommend it!

Let's go to Casa da Música

Concert of Miguel Borges Coelho {Porto, Casa da Música, 28. 4. 2010}

Beethoven: Bagatelles Op. 126

---> Sophisticated, beautiful and wise sound in the slower and more "singing" parts of Bagatelles, stiff upper hand in the rapid and dynamic parts, as result tone is not clear and uniformed; consequence: overall picture of some Bagatelles is not the most clear.

Arnold Schoenberg: Suite Op. 25

---> Very good and clear temporal structure, in my opinion lack of differentiation in the sound and a bit "tight-fisted" use of the pedal; so complex dodecafonic content is (despite good timing) difficult to understand without the latter.

Claude Debussy: Suite Pour le Piano

---> Solid.

Alexsander Skriabin: Five Preludes Op. 74

---> Late and great Skriabin's work. Despite the apparent continuity of the Preludes I missed some of substantial differences (surprises and diversity) in the sound, everything was "in the same room". However, I don't know the piece - maybe it is supposed to be like that.

Jorge Peixinho: Etude III in B-flat major

---> Beeing placed between this giants's works, (despite interesting and humorous experimentations around B-flat major chord) study comes out as a little bit banal. But once more, as I don't know the piece, I feel incompetent to evaluate the performance.

Bela Bartok: Suite Outdoors

---> In my opinion, first three movements were to smilar to eachother in terms of sound qualites (the first - "brutal one" was very well played, but then the second and the third were a bit too "brutal" as well), the fourth was great! (In direction of musical thought and even more in the sound - "almost out of this world"), fifth was powerful and soverign.

---> Encore: Satie ...