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My impressions from the live youtube event:
Mrs. Lisitsa is not for the perfectionist classical music listener. Even so that, she urged photographers to do their job during the Liszt Rhapsody, which was the first piece she played, because after that she said that the official concert would begin which would also be recorded for the Decca label. She was so comfortable playing along with the photographers shooting clicks.
But beginning with Mozart Fantasie, I felt that she was very tense, not to make a single mistake, and this continued with the Beethoven too. I can speculate that she was advised to play more freely and not care too much during the intermission. Which IMO, showed some evindence in the Rachmaninoff Etude. But then again things didn't go as good as she would want.
And finally Totentanz and the finale of Campanelle took their share from all the above.
At the end of the concert I really felt a bit sad for her. Because I could read her disappointment from her face. This event perhaps was very important for her and she could have dreamed it to come out much better.
Last edited by Hakki; 06/21/12 12:54 PM.
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I'm in that photo! Rear head shot, hence closer than you. Not sure I gave you permission Row 6, left, could see directly her hands. No blood after the Totentanz that I could see. I also enjoyed the concert, although, erm, I'm not a big fan of that music (what sort is that then?). There's a review of the concert here as was tweeted by Valentina. I used JS Pianos practice rooms to practice.
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Joined: May 2001
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I'm in that photo! Rear head shot, hence closer than you. Not sure I gave you permission Row 6, left, could see directly her hands. No blood after the Totentanz that I could see. I also enjoyed the concert, although, erm, I'm not a big fan of that music (what sort is that then?). There's a review of the concert here as was tweeted by Valentina. I used JS Pianos practice rooms to practice. Well, IMO that is a very generous review. Probably taking into account that she is coming from nowhere. But, I don't think this concert will silence her critics as claimed by the reviewer.
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I'm in that photo! Rear head shot, hence closer than you. Not sure I gave you permission Row 6, left, could see directly her hands. No blood after the Totentanz that I could see. I also enjoyed the concert, although, erm, I'm not a big fan of that music (what sort is that then?). There's a review of the concert here as was tweeted by Valentina. I used JS Pianos practice rooms to practice. Well, IMO that is a very generous review. Probably taking into account that she is coming from nowhere. But, I don't think this concert will silence her critics as claimed by the reviewer. Suspiciously generous...
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I'm in that photo! Rear head shot, hence closer than you. Not sure I gave you permission Row 6, left, could see directly her hands. No blood after the Totentanz that I could see. I also enjoyed the concert, although, erm, I'm not a big fan of that music (what sort is that then?). There's a review of the concert here as was tweeted by Valentina. I used JS Pianos practice rooms to practice. Well, IMO that is a very generous review. Probably taking into account that she is coming from nowhere. But, I don't think this concert will silence her critics as claimed by the reviewer. I agree that was a very generous review. On the other hand, there were only a couple of things that I didn't like. Nothing will silence her staunchest critics, probably ever. I didn't like the Mozart and was lukewarm on the Beethoven. I thought everything with Liszt's name attached, aside from "La Campanella", was not only excellent but better than many of her more respected peers. Likewise with Rach (loved the G minor, tempo and all). I don't really have an opinion of the Scriabin.
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I think, you are very generous too.
Starting with Erlkonig things really began to turn upside down for her. I bet she herself regretted that too. And she couldn't recover afterwards.
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Lengthy banter and some kind of light comedy act. For some reason, it reminded me of the "Rocky and Bullwinkle Show".
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She was reviewed in only one of the mainstream outlets, the Telegraph. Reasonably good but not superlative.3 stars out of 5. P.S> what's with the blue lights in the pictures? did they stay on?
Valentina Lisitsa, born in Ukraine but now living in America, is officially the web’s favourite classical pianist. Her YouTube site has had 43 million visitors, which is probably a thousand times more listeners than the great virtuosos of the past reached in their entire lifetimes.
It was clear that the promoters had tried hard to make this Albert Hall concert as close to the YouTube experience as possible. Two big screens carried close-up images of Lisitsa, and at every possible opportunity these were replaced by a publicity photo, which like all publicity photos was glamorous and anonymous.
They were almost comically inapt, as Lisitsa is neither glamorous nor anonymous. She came on to wild applause, cracked a joke about the Ukraine-England football match (at that moment under way) in an accent you could have cut with a knife, clearly nervous and anxious to get to the keyboard. Those were the only words we heard from her. She didn’t emote verbally about each piece à la James Rhodes, and when she played she didn’t strike flamboyant Lisztian poses like Lang Lang. Instead she sat hunched over the keyboard, smiling to herself as if oblivious to us and the live audience on her YouTube channel.
It soon became clear Lisitsa is a serious artist. She’d chosen a hugely taxing programme, book-ended with two Liszt showpieces.
She played these with urgent intensity and a feeling for their sudden moments of pathos, which lifted them out of their showpiece status. Her essential attribute is a fevered urgency, an almost desperate desire to suck the expressive marrow from a piece.
Joined to her iron-clad technique (Lisitsa is no wunderkind – she’s now 39, and has been practising hard since she was three), this often engendered a huge emotional charge, as in Liszt’s arrangement of Schubert’s Erlkonig. At the other end of the scale, the middle movement of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata was beautifully remote and poised, as if made from porcelain.
Not everything worked so well. Chopin’s C minor Nocturne was one of several pieces whose subtlety was dissipated in febrility.
This showed Lisitsa’s strength is also her weakness, in the sense that she identifies too much with each passing moment. She needs to take a more balanced view, temper her passion with a little distance and irony. But that may not be so immediately gratifying, either for herself or her millions of YouTube fans.
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I think, you are very generous too. I thought you might. I wasn't familiar with the Scriabin and I skipped over the Chopin. Maybe I would have been able to find less generous words for that to even out my comments.
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Lengthy banter and some kind of light comedy act. For some reason, it reminded me of the "Rocky and Bullwinkle Show". In laygirl language? Not googling it! By the way I do not think that Lisitsa has staunch critics / enemies per se. She is a good pianist. I think that the hype could backfire though, but that should not stop her. It would be good to see her more confident and not so visibly eager to please. Just convey her interpretation and break through the canned emotions.
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P.S> what's with the blue lights in the pictures? did they stay on?
Yes and no. The blue lights changed colour at the start of each new piece, along with other background lighting. I was sitting in the 'arena' or 'stalls' so at eye level with the piano legs and also the blue lights. Initially they were annoying but changes to softer yellow and orange hues meant I had forgotten about them by the end.
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My impressions from the live youtube event:
Mrs. Lisitsa is not for the perfectionist classical music listener. Even so that, she urged photographers to do their job during the Liszt Rhapsody, which was the first piece she played, because after that she said that the official concert would begin which would also be recorded for the Decca label. She was so comfortable playing along with the photographers shooting clicks.
But beginning with Mozart Fantasie, I felt that she was very tense, not to make a single mistake, and this continued with the Beethoven too. I can speculate that she was advised to play more freely and not care too much during the intermission. Which IMO, showed some evindence in the Rachmaninoff Etude. But then again things didn't go as good as she would want.
And finally Totentanz and the finale of Campanelle took their share from all the above.
At the end of the concert I really felt a bit sad for her. Because I could read her disappointment from her face. This event perhaps was very important for her and she could have dreamed it to come out much better.
I wonder if she put too much pressure on herself: the huge seating at Royal Albert Hall, the live video streaming, and then the permanent Decca recording. Especially the recording, where everything has to be note perfect. Not a lot of established artists would be so comfortable with their skills and their emotions that they would take such risks. On top of all this, she is trying to prove she can maneuver her way into the top rank of concert artists by building an internet audience and foregoing the traditional competition/agent route. Perhaps she should have gone with fewer blockbuster/knucklebuster pieces. Her entire program went from technically demanding to extremely demanding. She definitely can play very well and deserves to fill concert halls, but she might be better off asking less of herself so she can give more to the music.
Fazioli 228.
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Is there a "replay" on Youtube, by chance?
"And if we look at the works of J.S. Bach — a benevolent god to which all musicians should offer a prayer to defend themselves against mediocrity... -Debussy
"It's ok if you disagree with me. I can't force you to be right."
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...But beginning with Mozart Fantasie, I felt that she was very tense, not to make a single mistake, and this continued with the Beethoven too. I can speculate that she was advised to play more freely and not care too much during the intermission. Which IMO, showed some evindence in the Rachmaninoff Etude. But then again things didn't go as good as she would want.
I wonder if she put too much pressure on herself: the huge seating at Royal Albert Hall, the live video streaming, and then the permanent Decca recording. Especially the recording, where everything has to be note perfect. Not a lot of established artists would be so comfortable with their skills and their emotions that they would take such risks. First of all, Hakki's comments about what Lisitsa was feeling or told during intermission or concern for not making a mistake are purely speculative. And plenty of pianists make live recordings. It's extremely common. Finally, mistakes can be corrected even on a live recording.
Last edited by pianoloverus; 06/21/12 06:28 PM.
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Is there a "replay" on Youtube, by chance? I think this is it from page 2 (below). I watched it anyways.
Bad spellers of the world untie!
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i think she took many risks, both at the piano and in terms of the venue, non-conformance to the usual ground rules (audience included), streaming live on youtube AND being recorded for her first real label record. perhaps a few too many risks, but i thoroughly enjoyed the concert and applaud her for pressing the boundaries instead of shrinking to the usual safe, rigid and ensconced parameters of a classical piano concert.
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Lengthy banter and some kind of light comedy act. For some reason, it reminded me of the "Rocky and Bullwinkle Show". In laygirl language? Not googling it! By the way I do not think that Lisitsa has staunch critics / enemies per se. She is a good pianist. I think that the hype could backfire though, but that should not stop her. It would be good to see her more confident and not so visibly eager to please. Just convey her interpretation and break through the canned emotions. The accent is similar to Natasha, a Russian spy character on the show. (Boris and Natasha) The hype will backfire with the old guard. I don't think she should change at all. The old must die so the new can live, it seems.
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...But beginning with Mozart Fantasie, I felt that she was very tense, not to make a single mistake, and this continued with the Beethoven too. I can speculate that she was advised to play more freely and not care too much during the intermission. Which IMO, showed some evindence in the Rachmaninoff Etude. But then again things didn't go as good as she would want.
I wonder if she put too much pressure on herself: the huge seating at Royal Albert Hall, the live video streaming, and then the permanent Decca recording. Especially the recording, where everything has to be note perfect. Not a lot of established artists would be so comfortable with their skills and their emotions that they would take such risks. First of all, Hakki's comments about what Lisitsa was feeling or told during intermission or concern for not making a mistake are purely speculative. And plenty of pianists make live recordings. It's extremely common. Finally, mistakes can be corrected even on a live recording. I don't think they will ever dare to correct mistakes on a live recording. Because it will ruin all her past Youtube reputation.
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The hype will backfire with the old guard. I don't think she should change at all. The old must die so the new can live, it seems.
Ah but Plus ça change*.. Hype backfires on old and new, all the same * The more things change, the more they are the same, or something like that.
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I don't think they will ever dare to correct mistakes on a live recording. Because it will ruin all her past Youtube reputation.
Don't bet on it: Horowitz's great comeback concert after his self-imposed 'retirement' was taped and released on LP with most of the glaring mistakes corrected. The original unedited concert was only released for the first time a few years ago - on CD. Most live recordings these days are patched at a later session (often immediately following the concert) - not just to correct mistakes but also to remove coughs, ringtones, inappropriate applause, boos etc. However, I suspect Lisitsa's concert will be released unedited. She will prefer it that way, from what I've seen, and none of the wrong notes would be very obvious to the average punter for whom the music is unfamiliar (though I haven't managed to listen to the whole concert yet).
If music be the food of love, play on!
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