Lights, Piano, Action Aplenty at Brisbane Festival Click on pic to read Review Russian pianist, Evgeny Kissin, receives acclamations at his first Australian concert as part of the Brisbane Festival.  Picture: Hannah Millerick Source: Supplied

Evgeny Kissin in Recital Sydney Concert Review 16 September 2011 Russian pianist Evgeny Kissin made his Australian debut with the Sydney Symphony this week Please click on pic to read Review

Bashmet and Kissin show close rapport in Schubert and Shostakovich Mon Apr 18, 2011 at 7:36 pm By Lawrence A. Johnson While Riccardo Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra were wrapping up their weekend Carnegie Hall stand in New York Sunday afternoon, a large audience filled the orchestra’s home stage for a concert by violist Yuri Bashmet and pianist Evgeny Kissin. As always, there was a large Russian-speaking contingent in the house. “I’m really excited,” said Tatiana, a Moscow-born fan waiting in line at Will Call. “I’ve never heard either of them live and I’m looking forward to this.” Viola recitals are a rarity, especially by anyone who is not Pinchas Zukerman. But for a rare appearance by the enigmatic Bashmet with his celebrated colleague Kissin in support, Symphony Center was filled to the rafters. Sunday’s program led off with one of the chamber repertory’s cornerstone works, Schubert’s Arpeggione Sonata. The title instrument—a fretted guitar-like affair played with a bow— has gone the way of the dodo bird, and the melodic work is most often heard today on the cello. Bashmet made an equally worthy case for the viola. In the first movement, in particular, the slender, higher-voiced instrument seemed more suited to the relaxed cheer and Rococo essence of the music. With light bowing, Bashmet brought a Mozartian touch to the music, his younger colleague tempering his sonority to match Bashmet’s delicacy in Schubert’s bounteous flow of melody. The approach worked particularly well in the gentle reverie of the Adagio where both men subtly underlined the pensive expression. At times one wanted a more robust sound and variety of color from Bashment’s spare, rather dry timbre, but the concluding variations were energetic and vitally contrasted, some miscoordination at the coda apart. Brahms’ Viola Sonata in E flat major proved more controversial. Here Bashmet aptly brought a warmer, richer sound to this interior, autumnal work, originally crafted for clarinet. But at times the violist’s rubato seemed to push the rhapsodic nature of this music to an extreme, with slowing down and dawdling that impeded momentum. There were fine moments yet at times the two men’s styles didn’t always seem in synch with Kissin’s polished lyricism set against Bashmet’s quirkier approach—the violist coming at the music from more of an angle, along with some wayward intonation in the process. Shostakovich’s Viola Sonata was his final work, a bleak, death-haunted epitaph, which received the finest performance of the afternoon. From the barely audible pizzicatos that launch this dark journey, both Bashmet and Kissin seemed completely inside this music. The stark, meditative passages alternate with strange unsettling high harmonics and a fragmented theme with the feel of a Jewish folk strain that sounds like a dance of death. Bashmet’s edgy tone is well suited to the dark, acid tinge of this music. With finely calibrated, equally expressive support from Kissin, Bashmet brought out the introspective darkness as well as the stoicism, even finding a ray of peaceful solace at the coda in this affecting performance. Too bad the premature applause from some clap-happy audience members marred the hushed coda. No encore was offered and one would have sounded inappropriate after the black desolation of Shostakovich’s final musical testament. Kissin has enjoyed a successful trifecta in Chicago this season with appearances in a solo Liszt recital, in the Grieg concerto with the CSO, and now as a chamber team with Bashmet. We rarely get to experience Kissin as a duo-recital partner and in his third Chicago appearance in seven weeks, Kissin proved a gracious and often deferential colleague to Bashmet, while providing individual and eloquent keyboard playing. Chicago Classical Review Yuri Bashmet and Evgeny Kissin receive rave reviews 20 Apr 2011 Yuri Bashmet has received rave reviews for the first of three recitals with Evgeny Kissin in the US. In what was ‘one of the subtlest Chicago recitals in memory’, Bashmet’s performance of Schubert’s Arpeggione Sonata in A minor at Orchestra Hall, was described in the Chicago Tribune: ‘every note had life coming from color imaginatively shaded, with particular purity and radiance in the high register.’ And praise for the duo: ‘so perfect their command of style and mood, that all works conveyed an electric current running beneath them’ Bashmet and Kissin perform a further two recitals this month in Miami and at Carnegie Hall. The programme also includes Brahms Sonata for Piano and Viola No 2 and Shostakovich Sonata for Viola and Piano. International Classic Artists

Pianist Evgeny Kissin offers new flourish from the past By Jeremy Eichler Globe Staff / April 2, 2011 Evgeny Kissin (with conductor John Nelson) played Grieg’s Piano Concerto and Chopin’s First, as well as two encores, Thursday. (Stu Rosner) If last week’s invigorating Boston Symphony Orchestra program tilted toward the 21st century, with a living composer leading his own work from the podium, this week plunges back into the 19th century and reaches for an older era of Romantic pianism. Evgeny Kissin is the soloist in two big warhorse concertos, Grieg’s Piano Concerto and Chopin’s First, and conductor John Nelson filled out the program with two orchestral works by Liszt. By the end of the night, a sold-out Symphony Hall was roaring its approval, and shouts of "Bravo Genya!’’ could be heard. Kissin, seemingly undimmed by the evening’s exertions, sat down and effortlessly dispatched two encores, Grieg’s "Aus dem Karneval’’ (Op. 19, No. 3) followed by Chopin’s Waltz No. 14, and looked as if he could have easily kept going. Facility has never been an issue for this remarkable Russian pianist, who captured international attention when he was just 12 years old with his recording of the two Chopin concertos. That they were the same two Chopin works he has now played on two successive visits to the BSO, however, hints at bigger questions that have long hovered over his career: whether he has continued to sufficiently grow and deepen as an interpretive artist or to sufficiently expand his repertoire. In a way, this concert represented a modest instance of doing just that. The Grieg of course looms large in the piano world, but not in Kissin’s personal repertoire. This is only his second set of performances, the first having taken place just last week in Chicago. And this week’s original BSO program was to also include the seldom-heard Scriabin Piano Concerto in what would have been Kissin’s very first performances of that piece. According to a BSO spokesperson, the pianist ultimately decided one new work was enough and switched the Scriabin for the Chopin. At least he is thinking about terra incognita. Thursday night the Grieg received a vastly fresher performance than the Chopin, which you might expect, given the context. In the Grieg, the playing was alert, supple, and less canned, with Kissin summoning bold displays of power and refinement as needed. The pianist also has a gift for drawing a warm pearly tone from the instrument. Many of these qualities were nominally present in the Chopin, but the performance felt less inspired, more airless. The notes come so easily to Kissin that it can sometimes be hard to guess at what is behind them. Nelson was a responsive accompanist, though his Liszt selections (the Mephisto Waltz No. 1 for orchestra, and the symphonic poem "Orpheus’’) came across as a distant second to the evening’s main event. The Boston Globe

A passionate Kissin for BSO fans By Keith Powers : Saturday, April 2, 2011 Like the weather this March, pianist Evgeny Kissin came in like a lion and went out like one. After a tumultuously received recital earlier this month at Symphony Hall, Kissin returned Thursday to deliver two impeccably virtuosic concertos with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. It was the kind of evening concertgoers dream about: A stupendous soloist, energizing the audience, conductor and orchestra; a program that made sense on all levels; and an unexpected jolt — two concertos, not one. The kinetic John Nelson conducted, interspersing two Liszt orchestral sketches, "Mephisto Waltz" and "Orpheus," between concertos by Chopin and Grieg. The works created a thematic, historic and sonic unity that only magnified the mesmerizing performance. Liszt formed the centerpiece. He was a great pianist who in his day revered his predecessor Chopin and later promoted the younger Grieg — famously sight-reading the very concerto we heard on this program. And Kissin took the stage to prove that our age also has its piano champions, artists who subsume technical mastery into genuine artistic insight. Kissin, who impossibly turns 40 this year, has never really strayed from the Romantic repertory he loves. But, like Liszt and Chopin before him, he is our leader in its interpretation. He plays with a wild devotion to bringing out every sophisticated nuance, first by mastering the instrument, then by delving into the possibilities. The piano part of the Chopin concerto is tailor-made for an artist at the height of his powers. Sections of the slow movement seemed like he was whispering something magical. As for the Grieg, there are a few times each season when the orchestra visibly acknowledges sharing the stage with greatness, and even fewer when that presence raises the level of their playing. This was one such performance. The audience demanded and received two encores: Grieg’s "Karneval" and a Chopin waltz. It was snowing outside afterward; the lion had been here. Boston Herald.com

Dutoit concludes CSO residency with a fine flourish, with help from Evgeny Kissin John von Rhein Classical music critic 11:57 a.m. CDT, March 25, 2011 Russian pianist Evgeny Kissin accompanies the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at Orchestra Hall on Thursday. (Scott Strazzante/Chicago Tribune) Some critics have observed that while Charles Dutoit's concerts are seldom, if ever, disappointing, few add up to truly extraordinary experiences either. Yet one had no hesitation in putting the concert he directed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on Thursday night, concluding his two-week residency at Symphony Center, in the latter category. Of course any conductor fortunate enough to have Evgeny Kissin as soloist already has a conspicuous ace up his sleeve. The celebrated Russian pianist is favoring Orchestra Hall with three appearances this season, each focusing on a different aspect of his remarkable artistry. The second of the three brings the eternally popular Grieg Piano Concerto, a warhorse that could only benefit from the fresh rethinking of Kissin and Dutoit. The pianist did not set out to wow the audience with his colossal technique, but wow them he did, through an acute and caring sensitivity to matters musical. His performance reminded one why the Grieg concerto remains central to the romantic concerto tradition, looking backward as it does to Schumann's concerto in the same key and forward to the showier statements of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov. From the pianist's commanding entry through the splashy cadenza, his first movement was by turns full-blooded and delicate, his gracious pianism alert to the scherzando qualities of Grieg's keyboard writing. Kissin made a really lovely lyrical interlude of the Adagio, closely attended by Dutoit, who held the orchestra at a rapt distance. This led to a brisk, even impetuous finale in which both musicians honored the movement's marcato marking, though I found the apparent clicking of the pianist's fingernails on the keys somewhat distracting. Still, this was an exciting close to a warmly magisterial reading. The audience rose to its feet to give Kissin a prolonged ovation. He smiled shyly and bowed deeply before rewarding them with an encore, Grieg's solo piano arrangement of his famous song "Jeg elsker dig" ("I Love But Thee"). It, too, was beautifully done. Chicago Tribune and . . . . .  How (not) to get a picture with Kissin !!