Saturday 22 February 2014

Hélène Grimaud plays Brahms


Today, Friday, turned out to be Brahms day, with two hearings of his first piano concerto, and one of his second. Pianist in both was Hélène Grimaud and I greatly enjoyed her playing. The orchestral background was suitably rich and Brahmsian (Bavarian Radio orchestra, and Vienna Philharmonic in respectively the first and second concertos). Against this rich background, Ms Grimaud's clarity and transparency of textures was very welcome. It is many years since I have heard the first concerto -- to my surprise, I discovered that until today I no longer had any recording of it; again to my surprise, I found I enjoyed the first concerto even more than the second. Tastes change, with age and experience. I had not expected to enjoy Ms Grimaud's playing in Brahms as much as I did, but these are performances I shall return to often, with pleasure. Good recording and balance. Usual tacky DG notes, with no less than eight photographs of the attractive Ms Grimaud, most of them with staring eyes that remind me of a deer caught in the headlights.

Probably a couple of weeks pause in this blog while I take off for Northern Thailand and Laos. Lots of sun and good food, I hope, but probably little music until I return.

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