Natalia Sokolovskaya
by richibi
though there have been gems among
the performances presented during
Stage l of the 14th Arthur Rubinstein
International Piano Master Competition,
in Stage ll each contestant has been for
me outstanding, I’ve now seen six of
the 16 remaining contenders out of the
original 36, 20 are gone, cast away by
the 7 judges
Natalia Sokolovskaya had mightily
impressed me at Stage l with,
especially, her own “8 Variations
on a Theme of Paganini” (at 15:00
minutes on the tape), you’ll remember
Rachmaninov’s “Rhapsody“ on the
same theme, but for entire orchestra,
Sokolovskaya writes hers for piano
alone, the original theme, from
Paganini’s 24th Caprice, had been
of course for violin
at Stage ll her Rachmaninov First
Sonata (at 20:00 minutes) is
transcendent, surely definitive, this
is the one I’m going to remember
her Spanish pieces (at 10:00), a
couple of compositions by Albéniz,
are a wonderful break from the often
very abstract other works on offer,
with their immediately captivating,
beguiling, indeed seductive, rhythms
she even makes the very trite
“Reflections on Love” (at 00:00), a
condition of the competition, credible,
by spacing its interchangeable
movements, pausing between them,
letting them breathe, in order to
separate the varied “Reflections”,
instead of stringing them all together
as a continuous, rather than discrete
elements of a, considered whole, as
all the other performers have to date
reflexively done
no one has written anything pertinent
about love, musically, since Chopin,
with the exception of often enough
Rachmaninov, to presume to
significantly comment on love is, to
my mind, pretentious, calling for a
fall, this composer is no exception,
her thoughts are to be expected, love
is atonal, arhytmic, loud, soft, tender,
tempestuous, strident, placating
but everyone already knew that
Sokolovskaya gives the “Reflections”
dignity nevertheless despite their
overt pretensions
Richard
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