Soloist: Alexei Volodin (piano)
The Mariinsky Orchestra
Conductor: Daniel Raiskin
PROGRAMME:
piano concerti by Johannes Brahms
The final concert of the International Piano Festival will see an appearance by soloist Alexei Volodin – already familiar to St Petersburg audiences – with the Mariinsky Orchestra being conducted by Daniel Raiskin. Both the pianist and the conductor were born in St Petersburg and, having trained in Russia, have embarked on successful international careers, today performing at the world’s most prestigious venues. In April last year at the Concert Hall of the Mariinsky Theatre Alexei Volodin and Daniel Raiskin performed Beethoven’s five piano concerti in one evening.
The performance of two concerti by Brahms presents no lesser difficulty. Brahms’ First and Second Piano Concerti are separated by twenty years. To a great extent, these works are antipodean versions of each other. The romantic impetuosity and passionate impulsiveness of the First Concerto in D Minor, Op. 15, gives way to the philosophical contentment and contemplative sadness of the Second Concerto in B Flat Major, Op. 83. If the First Concerto was initially envisioned by the composer as a sonata for two pianos and one of the aims of the work was to demonstrate Brahms’ own incredible pianistic skill then the Second Concerto, even in its four-part structure, is rather like a symphony which features the piano. So the performers must tackle the complex musical tasks of Brahms’ style, and the perceptible length (some fifty minutes) of both concerti gives audiences a wonderful opportunity to judge the skill of the musicians.
Yegor Kovalevsky
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