Wigmore Hall
Schumann: Three Fantasy Pieces, op.111; Faschingsschwank aus Wien, op.26
Chopin: Barcarolle in F-sharp major, op.60; Impromptus no.1 in A-flat major, op.29, no.2 in F-sharp major, op.36, in G-flat major, op.51; Scherzo no.4 in E major, op.54; Polonaise in A-flat major, op.53
Nikolai Lugansky (piano)
Nikolai Lugansky’s sold-out Wigmore Hall recital offered a classic, if never entirely predictable programme of Schumann and Chopin. There were no complaints from me, starting as the evening did with a rare opportunity to hear Schumann’s late set of Three Fantasy Pieces, op.111. The first, in C minor, seemed in its passionately Romantic mood to offer a recollection of the Intermezzo from Faschingsschwank aus Wien (to follow), exquisitely turned, with finely gradated climaxes. The second, A-flat major piece was noble of utterance, akin to a Shakespeare soliloquy as heard via the Romantic translations of Friedrich Schlegel and Ludwig Tieck, its central section, returning to the minor mode, offering Brahmsian contrast, albeit never overdone. Echoes of Schubert haunted the return to C minor in the third, inner voicing revealing throughout.
Schumann marks the opening ‘Allegro’ of his Faschingsschwank (Carnival Jest) ‘Sehr lebhaft’. It was certainly very lively in tempo, though it might have smiled a little more readily, a slight reservation that held for much of the work. This movement was nonetheless mercurial, its freedom founded on keenly-sprung rhythms, as would be the case for the finale, ‘Höchst lebhaft’, Schumann’s sonata-like framing compellingly brought to life in an integrative performance by Lugansky. In between, the pianist leaned in just enough to confide a further soliloquy in the ‘Romanze’, pedalling unfashionably expressive and all the better for it. An otherwise plain-spoken Scherzino benefited from Beethovenian lilt. Keen etching of the Intermezzo rendered it all the more moving, heightening the connection with the first piece from the opening set.
If the Schumann performances were excellent, Lugansky’s Chopin was still more involving. The Barcarolle expressed affinity with what had passed previously and still more difference. Waves lapped beneath a finely turned vocal melody, in a delectable yet muscular, and ultimately magical performance that took the breath away. The three numbered Impromptus followed. If the first is not my favourite Chopin, Lugansky again spun its line with a just degree of elegance. The second, a more surprising piece, combined elegance and Romantic ardour. The third instalment offered emotional depth and musical integration in form and harmony alike; Lugansky cherished it for the masterwork it is without suffocation. The Scherzo’s opening trajectory glanced back to Schumann’s Vienna before pursuing its very different path. It received an eloquent performance with the grandest of perorations—at least prior to the wounded pride, still dancing, of the A-flat Polonaise.
I said the recital encompassed two halves,
but we were then treated to a third section, of no fewer than four encores. Lugansky’s
limpid Grieg ‘Arietta’ was never milked and thus moved all the more. The ‘missing’
Chopin Fantaisie-Impromptu followed in brazen, transporting, breathtaking defiance.
It brought tears to my eyes, as did the different, yet kindred nobility brought
out in Liszt’s transcription of Schumann’s ‘Widmung’, spun gorgeously, quite
without narcissism, from fine Egyptian cotton. I was unfamiliar with the
fourth, which I guessed might have been Rachmaninov, and so it turned out to be:
an arrangement of the fifth of the composer’s vocal Romances, op.21: ‘Lilacs’.
If I found it less musically compelling, it followed on well enough from Liszt
and was here ravishingly despatched.
Mark Berry
