Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Valentina Lisitsa--"Rach Project"

Interesting that you bring up Lortie. Several years ago I attended an orchestral rehearsal (a free afternoon), and had the pleasure of seeing Lortie in action. He didn't even use the music for Mozart 23, and his interaction with the conductor was a model of give-and-take... he seemed like a very pleasant chap. I made it a point to meet him after the rehearsal. What a wonderful man.

The second half of the concert rehearsal was the Bruckner 7th, and I hope I will be forgiven (OSK- hold your fire!) if I observe that the great symphonic tradition established and perfected by Beethoven found a true successor with Bruckner, slightly bypassing the earnest efforts of Brahms to be the keeper of the flame.

But of course it was Wagner who IMO was the real successor of Beethoven, the only genius to be measured in Beethovenian terms.

Good God, I've had it with you and your opinion/factual crap and THAT is a FACT. You're going to continue complaining about it though, because I'm not going to change the way I state things to suit you.

Unless your feigning anger it probably is a fact. Maybe you're at least beginning to understand the difference between a opinion and a fact.

That's not anger. I completely understand the difference, by the way.

Seems I recall hearing, during the documentary about Valentina's "Rach Project", an individual loaned her their Steinway. Believe they stated that it was a superior piano.

I really like the sound of that piano. How do some of you with more experienced ears hear it? It's sure easy to hear the difference between it and the 1925, 275 Bosendorfer she often plays. Due to it's age, would'nt this piano be more mellow than the typical Bosendorfer?

Bech

It's not just the piano...it's the recording devices, your speakers, the youtube audio compression.... not every steinway sounds like that.

Don't label a sound with a brand, because what you hear through the speakers is often completely unrelated to the brand of the piano, but rather the work of the tuner, sound engineers, recording devices, speakers, audio files, etc.

Actually, whether music-making is good or not is only partially a subjective thing, and pointing out that some people may like Lisitsa's playing because they lack experience in evaluating what they hear is not immature.

Outside of the professionals, many of us with a long-abiding interest in music (or any of the other arts, or various other pursuits, for that matter) eventually become connoisseurs with varying levels of expertise. Connoisseurs (along with professionals, of course) are sometimes able to tell if somebody is good in a way that is much less subjective than you might think. Sometimes it is an objective evaluation of our subjective reactions, based on lots of experience.

Whether or not a connoisseur can clearly verbalize what they are thinking and experiencing when listening to someone play is not really an indication of anything other than their skill in that department. Since a lot of what makes music work famously defies explanation and verbalization, I guess it is easy to come to the conclusion that "it's all subjective" - but it isn't. Of course, all this varies with the individual, and no one is infallible, and there will always be disagreement between knowledgeable people, too. But experience and expertise still do count.

Speculating back to my own teens and twenties, had I heard Lisitsa back then, I might very well have been bowled over, too. But that doesn't mean I would have been right in my assessment of her music-making. I had plenty of musical enthusiasms that have not stood up well to the passage of time, and back then I often just couldn't figure out why some professionals I knew didn't share those enthusiasms. Now I know why - it was because the stuff really wasn't that good and they had the background necessary to make that judgment.

I like some of VL stuff, but some other that goes on the web seems to me a bit of INDUSTRIAL playing. Just ebcause u can learn th notes in no time and play a piece doesn t mean you should hang it on utube straight away. I think repertoire needs to mature and grow in the artist. VL seems to be constantly putting out stuff - great for the audiences as she shows a lot of a pianist's life that we don t get to see. But i wonder if this is helping her career that much. She gets contracts, maybe, but her recordings up to now are pretty much being ignored.

You are being incredibly self important and patronising wr. As people get older they very often tend to just become more sure that they are correct in what they think, not necessary any better qualified in their opinions. I'm only 20 and so couldn't possible form a complex opinion on a subject, but I know professional pianists and musicians in their 40s and 50s who have complimentary things to say about a lot of her stuff, and presumably all of the seasoned music critics who attend her concerts alongside the plebs who don't know any better and yet still write glowing reviews don't know what they think either? I'm not trying to change your opinion of Valentina. Just accept that other people disagree with you, and you're not necessarily better placed to judge than they are.

Kuanpiano,

I agree, your point about there being more involved than just the piano when you hear it on YouTube is a good one.

Wr,

I have admitted many times in other posts that I am new to classical music and concert pianists. This makes it easy to be really excited about a concert pianist's exceptional abilities.

Good to hear that you too were at one time less experienced and liked artists that you no longer care so much for. Well.....we all start somewhere, right?

I've always loved a quality piano sound and by recently discovering the world of classical pianists I've found plenty to be excited about. Add exceptional virtuosity and it's just icing on the cake!

Too, I've had some experience with various musical instruments and that helps me to better appreciate this virtuosity.

Bech

I think (gotta be careful here) that the text I have marked shows you were expressing an opinion, one of several possibilities. But I guess I could be wrong...

I think I missed the one "I think" in that post among the rest of what I'd call trash talking. I'd agree that even one "I think" better than none.

I love how that second sentence so exactly fits the description given in the first.

At any rate, I am unaware of the vast hordes of old geezers in the music business who think Lisitsa is exceptional, and cherry-picking a few reviews doesn't impress (I haven't forgotten the Hatto affair). You will have noticed that a number of us patronizing condescending elitists right here were not exactly thrilled with that Chopin Fantasie of hers that was posted not long ago, not that numbers really are the issue.

I really like how well you have managed to say what I think needed to be said on this subject. It's as though musical works have wavelengths and, while there are a variety of things that can be said and felt by performer(s) and audience when tuned into the music's frequency, it's harder to warm to a performer whose dial is turned to a different place.

I find myself really wanting to like Valentina's playing, and I feel sad that I don't. I found her interpretation of Rachmaninoff's First Piano Sonata hauntingly impressive and magical. Compared to everything else I've heard her play, it's as if she entered a different world with that sonata. I remember reading somewhere that it isn't enough to love the music you play, but the music must also love you. If she can focus on music that loves her, I think/feel/hope that there could be a great artist in her, not yet realized. But most of her stuff "leaves me cold", to borrow words from another member. Her recent Chopin Fantasy, for example, truly exasperated me. My gut reaction was, "Sheesh, she doesn't understand* what she's playing!" I had to hold myself back from posting to that thread because I was worried I'd get worked up into an angry-sounding diatribe that would just hurt people and make enemies!

* "Understand" does not solely (or even mainly) mean intellectually here.

Argh, enemies of reason.

Si jeunesse savait, si vieillesse pouvait!!

Is there an English version?

Bech

Trash talk? What? Are you serious? If you really want trash talk then fasten your seat belt because I can for sure deliver and it wouldn't be pretty (of course I can't let loose here as we all live in fear of the red pencil/red boot).

I do have to disagree with one point stores, I absolutely do not think she is pretty A better example of that would be Lola Astanova.

Though I would still much prefer to listen Louis Lortie and putting up a picture of Jessica Alba.

I e-mailed Valentina about her putting this Rach Project on DVD and her response was it would cost her too much money to do so. She said it'll be on CD, for sure, even if it's a "self-release." She said, after all the years that have passed since Rachmaninoff composed those concertos, musicians still have to pay to play it for performance. Too, she said the orchestra was union and would also have to be paid.

I told her I liked the sound of the Steinway she played for this project and she responded: "It was magnificent." She said the English piano technician who owns it is a genius. This performance took place in England.

I think it pretty nice to be able to contact a concert pianist and get a response. Not commonly done, I'm sure. Tells you something about Valentina.

Bech