Rachmaninoff

With most major orchestras in this country apparently wedded forever to the notion that only foreign conductors are really qualified to hold the position of music director, it's comforting to be reminded of the remarkable fusion of talent and energy between Los Angeles-born Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony. Such a reminder came Saturday afternoon at the Kennedy Center. Presented by the Washington Performing Arts Society, the Californians served up a meaty, filling program that found both conductor and ensemble in impressive form.

Last year, when Concert Artists of Baltimore planned the March program for its 2012-2013 season, the most interesting part was the repertoire -- an unusual pairing of Beethoven's Mass in C with Saint-Saens' Piano Concerto No. 2. By the time that program arrived over the weekend, there was something a lot newsier about it. The soloist in the concerto, Peabody grad Eric Zuber, was recently chosen to be one of 30 participants in the International Van...

The Baltimore Symphony is performing two staples of the 19th-century Russian repertoire through tomorrow at the Meyerhoff, the Tchaikovsky Sixth and Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto.Both are so famous that they are often referred to as war-horses. Unfortunately, only the Rachmaninoff transcended its reputation Wednesday night.Andre Watts delivered a sparkling and no-nonsense treatment of the Rachmaninoff Second Piano Concerto. His performance delivered in almost every department.Best of all was the eloquent second movement, when Watts played with tenderness and precision.

There is no shortage of pianists with pristine techniques today. There is even a decent supply of polished pianists who possess the rarer attribute of musicality. But Marc-Andre Hamelin still stands out from the pack. Critics have been known to sound more like fan club presidents when describing Hamelin performances, tossing off adjectives like "legendary," "fearless" and "electrifying," or even giving him the title "piano superhero. " Baltimore will get a chance to sample Hamelin's artistry when he makes his Shriver Hall Concert Series debut on Sunday.

Rachmaninoff, Sonata No. 2 (opus 36), "Morceaux de fantasie" (opus 3) and "Chopin Variations" (opus 22), performed by pianist Santiago Rodriguez (Elan 82248); Rachmaninoff, 10 Preludes (opus 23), Three Nocturnes, "Song Without Words" and "Corelli Variations" (opus 42), performed by Rodriguez (Elan 82250); Rachmaninoff, Concerto No. 2, "Paganini Rhapsody" and several pieces for solo piano, performed by pianist Benno Moiseiwitsch, London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by (in Concerto No. 2)

Where talent is concerned, there are rarely any surprises in the music business. Two weeks ago when Ju Hee Suh was named by the Baltimore Symphony as a replacement for Zoltan Kocis in this week's performances of the Rachmaninoff Concerto No. 2, this listener suspected that she would give a performance that would bring the house down. Last night, of course, she did.Music insiders have been hearing reports for at least a decade about a fantastically talented young Korean-born pianist at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia.

Rachmaninoff, Sonata No. 1 in D minor (opus 28) and Variations on a Theme of Chopin (opus 22), performed by pianist Boris Berezovsky (Teldec 4509-90890). Rachmaninoff, Sonata No. 1 in D minor (opus 28) and Thirteen Preludes (opus 32), performed by pianist Santiago Rodriguez (Elan CD 82244).This is an embarrassment of riches. For years Rachmaninoff's First Sonata has fared poorly on records and in the concert hall. The work is gigantic -- almost as long the Concerto No. 3 -- and horrendously difficult.

For sheer novelty value, this week's all-20th-century Baltimore Symphony Orchestra program was hard to beat. For substance and potent music-making, it stood out, too. Two well-known composers, Rachmaninoff and Bernstein, were on the bill, but represented by lesser-known pieces. And anything by contemporary Austrian composer HK Gruber is well out of the mainstream. It takes nerve, not to mention imagination, for a conductor to lead such a program in his debut with an orchestra. Junichi Hirokami, former principal conductor of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, seemed thoroughly fearless Thursday night as he led the BSO for the first time.

Alexander Toradze's account of Rachmaninoff's Third Piano Concerto is both fascinating and perverse, enthralling and infuriating.The performance that the 39-year-old Georgian-born, Russian-trained pianist gave of the piece last night in Meyerhoff Hall with the Baltimore Symphony and guest conductor Zdenek Macal was the slowest that this listener has ever heard.At about 48 minutes, it was a full quarter of an hour longer than the first recorded performances of the composer himself and of Vladimir Horowitz (albeit with a few cuts)

At nearly the last hour, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra has found a way to offer the public an opportunity to own a permanent souvenir of its exceptional chemistry with outgoing music director Yuri Temirkanov. It doesn't come cheap, but it's worth the price. A compact disc of Rachmaninoff's surging Symphony No. 2, recorded live in 2004, will go on sale tomorrow, available for a contribution of $100 or more to the orchestra's newly established Great Artists Fund. Since Temirkanov and the BSO made no commercial recordings during his six years at the helm, the release has instant significance.

Blond and boyishly handsome, Vasily Petrenko might be mistaken for a gymnast, or perhaps a player of his favorite sport, soccer. But when the 35-year-old Russian conductor steps onto a podium, there's no doubt about his true calling. In 2009, Petrenko made a striking debut with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra in an all-Russian program that included the most arresting Tchaikovsky and Shostakovich performances since Yuri Temirkanov stepped down as that ensemble's music director a few years earlier.

Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff is best known for two wildly popular piano concertos, his sumptuous Second Symphony and some brilliant solo keyboard music. But if he had written nothing but the "All-Night Vigil," an unaccompanied choral work from 1915 also known as the "Vespers," Rachmaninoff would still rank among the greats. This subtly powerful setting of texts from the Russian Orthodox liturgy will be performed by the Baltimore Choral Arts Society in an unusual presentation incorporating readings from Shakespeare, Chekhov and others.

With a coming-full-circle flourish, the Baltimore Symphony is putting the grand in the grand finale of its 2008-2009 season. Way back in September, music director Marin Alsop started things off with the Immolation Scene from Wagner's Gotterdammerung, those traumatic/cleansing moments at the end of the composer's massive Ring Cycle. Alsop now wraps things up with a good 50 minutes or so of excerpts from the four Ring operas, culminating, of course, with that cathartic Immolation Scene. Nice symmetry.

It's something of a cliche that young musicians keep getting better and better technically, that they attain virtuosity at an earlier and higher level than ever before. A truer cliche was never spoken. Fresh evidence emerged Saturday night during the finals of the 2007 William Kapell International Piano Competition. Russian-born Sofya Gulyak, the 27-year- old winner of the $25,000 first prize, demonstrated fearless technique in Rachmaninoff's Concerto No. 3, tearing through the finger-busting-est passages as if they were exercises for beginners.

MOSCOW -- The workers labor in a vast factory furnished with electrical saws and half-cut timber slabs that are part of a vanishing tradition, sanding wood to a smooth finish, drilling holes in what at first seem random shapes, then stretching long copper-and-steel wires, to finish the construction of one of Russia's cultural icons: a piano. In the country of Rachmaninoff and Rimsky-Korsakov, the Lira plant here in the capital is the last factory mass-producing acoustic pianos in Russia.

At nearly the last hour, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra has found a way to offer the public an opportunity to own a permanent souvenir of its exceptional chemistry with outgoing music director Yuri Temirkanov. It doesn't come cheap, but it's worth the price. A compact disc of Rachmaninoff's surging Symphony No. 2, recorded live in 2004, will go on sale tomorrow, available for a contribution of $100 or more to the orchestra's newly established Great Artists Fund. Since Temirkanov and the BSO made no commercial recordings during his six years at the helm, the release has instant significance.

The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra's current "Favorites" program looks like just a case of choosing one from column A (favorite symphonies), one from column B (favorite concertos). After all, there isn't too much that Mendelssohn and Rachmaninoff have in common. But last night's performance of the former's Scottish Symphony and the latter's Piano Concerto No. 3 brought out a rather surprising bond between them - elegance. Maybe that shouldn't have been surprising. Maybe Rachmaninoff's music is so often pushed over the top into a mushy, super-romantic goo, or exploited primarily for opportunities to demonstrate blatant virtuosity, that it seems far removed from Mendelssohn's supremely tasteful realm.

Blond and boyishly handsome, Vasily Petrenko might be mistaken for a gymnast, or perhaps a player of his favorite sport, soccer. But when the 35-year-old Russian conductor steps onto a podium, there's no doubt about his true calling. In 2009, Petrenko made a striking debut with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra in an all-Russian program that included the most arresting Tchaikovsky and Shostakovich performances since Yuri Temirkanov stepped down as that ensemble's music director a few years earlier.

FORT WORTH -- Every four years, optimists, realists and skeptics alike gather here to witness an intense rite not entirely unlike the great cattle drives that once rolled through this friendly city. A strong stock of eager, tightly focused musicians parade past a seasoned jury, an enthusiastic public and a sizable contingent of the domestic and foreign press as they take their best shot at fame and fortune in the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, probably the best known and most closely watched event of its kind in the world.