SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Schumann, Chopin, Debussy: Maurizio Pollini (piano). Royal Festival Hall, 10.6. 2008 (CC)


Maurizio Pollini never fails to fascinate, even to amaze. But, on occasion, he can add a certain measure of frustration into the mix, and such was the case here.

I believe Pollini once identified Horowitz as a pianist he admired. It might seem a strange parallel on the surface, but the opening of Kreisleriana had me thinking of the late Horowitz DG recording (1985) of this piece. Fragile, even rather unsteady on its feet, it at least acted as an entrance point into an interpretation that found Pollini eliciting an uncharacteristically warm sound from his Fabbrini Steinway. Even when a harder attack was called for, the pianist compensated by ensuring a burnished bass end. Winding harmonic progresions always had direction. This was not great Schumann playing, though – and what was more frustrating was the way in which one could hear Pollini actually improve as the work progressed. The ill-at-ease beginning and some moments of technical fragility seemed at odds with later moments of real magic.

Actually, the highlight of the recital was the set of four Chopin Mazurkas, Op. 33. The first (G sharp minor) emerged in Pollini’s hands  as more of a composition in search of a mazurka than as mazurka proper. Indeed, there was more spontaneity in this performance of Op. 33 than in the rest of the programme. The final, and most extended, Mazurka (B minor) was gripping in its sparsely textured explorations.

I believe that the reasoning behind the First Chopin Scherzo ending the first half was to point out a link between the opening of this and the opening of Kreisleriana. Certainly there was a sense of déjü vu ,just  as there was at the bareness of the bars prior to the reassertion of the opening (drawing a parallel with the world of Op. 33/4). Virtuosity was the order of the day in this Scherzo, somewhat at the expense of the more introverted passages.

Back in 2003, Pollini had coupled Chopin with the second book of Debussy Préludes. Here it was the first book that was presented. The earlier recital had been successful in projecting Pollini’s trademark clarity with Debussian elusive utterance; here the results were rather more mixed. One could hear a lot of Michelangeli in the emotional distancing of “Danseuses de Delphes” (one could hear a lot of grunting from the pianist, too), and the literal approach marred the chordal descents of “Le vent dans la plaine” and led to an underplaying of the gestural element of “Les collines d’Anacapri” (amazing bass legato, though). It will come as no surprise, surely, that Pollini does not do sleazy, and while the “West Wind” was huge, the question was how Debussian was it?. Pollini seemed to want to point it squarely in the direction of Boulez.

The low point was surely “La fille aux cheveux de lin”, an ice maiden if ever there was one. The highpoint, though, was an exquisite “Danse de Puck”, full of real tonal variety and superb delineation of voices.

There were three encores, the first surprising (Liszt, a Transcendental Study). From thence onto more familiar encore territory, Chopin’s “Revolutionary” Study and his First Ballade.

Colin Clarke


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