Piemontesi, Schubert and Liszt, 9 May 2025

Wigmore Hall

Schubert: Fantasy in C major, D 605a, ‘Graz’
Schubert: Four Impromptus, D 935
Liszt: Piano Sonata in B minor, S 178

Francesco Piemontesi (piano)

  

Francesco Piemontesi offered a series of surprises, none unwelcome, in this fine Wigmore Hall recital of music by Schubert and Liszt. No piece was taken for granted, though by the same token, none was remoulded for the sake of remoulding. An array of possibilities was brought to life through exquisite command of touch and formidable foundation of intellect. 

The so-called ‘Graz’ Fantasy, D 605a, made for an excellent, even spellbinding opening. I was immediately put in mind of an observation by Donald Tovey on the piano music of Liszt, that it showed – irrespective of its musical quality – he was incapable of making an ugly sound on the keyboard.  Simple C major arpeggios sounded as if they were the rarest things in the world, the fifth bar’s flattened submediant piercing as perhaps only Schubert can. The first section as a whole emerged as something akin to a threshold for pianistic Romanticism, its fantasia quality, harking back to Mozart and beyond, in gradual self-revelation. The alla polacca music, in a typically distant – as distant as one can be – F-sharp major was delightfully quirky, dancing as if it were early Chopin. As the music became more involved, Piemontesi’s performance was never cluttered; here, as elsewhere, there was always space, irrespective of tempo, whose fundamental qualities always endured. The serenity with which opening material returned was deeply touching. 

The advent of the first of four impromptus, that in F minor, felt like the opening of a new chapter: not exactly presaged by the Fantasy, yet foretold. This was, of course, a different Schubert, from the close of his all-too-brief compositional life; and yet, without contrivance, it was also the same Schubert, similarly spun from the finest of Egyptian cotton, if that is not to undersell. There was something dream-like, though not too dream-like, to the piece’s progression, to the emergence of music that had somehow always been there, waiting simply to be voiced as a song without words. Its ambivalence and the pain of return to the tonic could hardly have been more movingly conveyed. Perhaps the second impromptu, the A-flat Allegretto, was a little understated, a little too innig; or perhaps that was simply a matter of taste. There was no doubting its lyricism, nor that of the B-flat theme and variations, Piemontesi’s disinclination to make a meal of it welcome. Subtlety of melodic line, the telling quality of lilt and breath, and the ‘natural’ quality to this music-making, not least in the unexaggerated pathos of the fourth variation, all proved telling. One can overdo the ‘sonata’ designation to these pieces; if Schubert had intended them as such, he would doubtless have said so. Nonetheless, the fourth, returning to F minor, felt very much like a finale: one that foretold Brahms still more than Liszt, taking its leave nonetheless from the world of the Moments musicaux. 

In the introduction to Liszt’s B minor Sonata, Piemontesi seemed determined to show – more to the point, he did – that preconceived oppositions are worth no more than the ether into which they are typed. This music can be taut and rhetorical, if one so chooses, and will most probably benefit from such integrative performance. At any rate, it provided quite the launch pad for the exposition proper, whose initial combination of fury and rhythmic insistence sounded new, not to be compared to previous ‘schools’ of performance. Throughout, decisions that initially had me wonder provided their own confirmation, for instance the continued insistent quality for the coming of the second group. Though on a considerably grander scale, the work in context nonetheless emerged as a mercurial, sulphurous successor to the Schubert Fantasy—not that Liszt could have known it, undiscovered until 1962. Yet its concision truly told too, Liszt’s Beethovenian side inevitably revealing itself amidst, indeed through, the grandiloquence. Again, there was no sense of being rushed; time seemed almost to stand still prior to the fugato, which verily bolted, preparing the way inevitably for return. The (certain) uncertainty in aftershock was not the least surprise in what felt like a symphonic poem for, certainly not reduced to, piano. 

Two encores, both again welcome surprises, were a lively account Wilhelm Kempff’s transcription of Bach’s Chorale Prelude, ‘Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme,‘ BWV 645, which built magnificently, and a delectable response in ‘Au lac de Wallenstadt’ from Liszt’s first (Swiss) book of Années de pèlerinage.

Piemontesi - Mozart, 15 December 2016

Wigmore Hall

Piano Sonata no.4 in E-flat major, KV 282/189g

Piano Sonata no.12 in F major, KV 332/300k
Piano Sonata no.5 in G major, KV 283/189h
Piano Sonata no.15 in F major, KV 533 & 494

Francesco Piemontesi (piano)

I shall deal with the first ‘half’ – that is, the E-flat major Sonata and the first movement of KV 332/300k – quickly, since, thanks to a stray electronic device, it was not really possible to assess, or indeed to enjoy, Francesco Piemontesi’s performances. (It is not something on which I wish to dwell, but I could hardly write about the concert and not mention it.) The first movement of KV 282/189g went relatively undisturbed. It sang as a true Adagio, imbued with a sense of the luminous, even numinous; this was, we rightly felt, special music, conveyed with (mostly) chaste passion. Harmonic surprises told without exaggeration. The first Minuet had a spring in its step, the second contrasting of its own nature, the subtlest of rubato aiding its way. Alas, the closing Allegro’s performance seemed compelling, but it became almost impossible to tell. There was certainly just as varied a palette of articulation and dynamics. Lively, and characterful, the F major Sonata, KV 332/300k, sounded as if it had come straight from the world of opera buffa, albeit with a few more seria moments. I was struck anew by the extraordinary concision of the development section, but already a high-pitched noise was rendering the performance unlistenable, and, more to the point, the pianist visibly disconcerted. Despite a gestural plea from him and a second verbal request from the Director, John Gilhooly, to check hearing aids, our own and those around us, interference continued. It was decided to bring forward the interval: a pity, but undoubtedly the right thing to do in the circumstances.

 

The second ‘half’ opened in an atmosphere of increasing relief (in more than one sense). The slow movement of the F major Sonata, with which it began, flowed nicely; more ‘Classical’ than ‘Romantic’ in conception, without underselling its seductive beauties. Piemontesi very much had the measure of Mozart’s string-like writing in certain of the left-hand passages. The composer’s written-in ‘ornamentation’ proved melodically generative in itself. Allegro assai is Mozart’s marking for the finale – how I struggled with this, many moons ago, for my Grade 8! – and Allegro assai it was, in a highly yet not excessively rhetorical reading. It was recognisably of a similar operatic world to the first and second movements.
 

We returned, then, to the earlier Mozart, to the G major Sonata, KV 283/189h. Overflowing with melody, the first movement benefited greatly from due attention to the twin gestural and structural roles of motivic offshoots of those melodies. A fruitful tension between twin beauties, pristine and more complex, performed a similar role in the ensuing Andante. Likewise in the finale. Perhaps it is not an entirely successful work, at least when judged by the standards of the fully mature composer, but even its problems fascinate, ensnare, especially in a performance such as this. Piemontesi’s suggestions of the orchestral tutti were well judged, as was the sense, once again, of opera seria (Lucio Silla, perhaps?)

The second of the F major Sonatas we heard received perhaps the finest performance of all. In the first movement, its Bachian lessons learned, loved, absorbed into a tonal and dramatic universe as all-encompassing as that of Shakespeare, we heard a command of line such that primacy of melody could both be reinstated and, vis-à-vis the harmony beneath, subtly questioned. Balance was the thing in the counterpoint, just as it should be. I initially found the Andante a little on the cool side, although there was no doubting its poise, nor its clarity. Greater volubility came with the development’s minor mode – how could it not? – and its extreme chromaticism, such frightening intensification making retrospective sense of what I had first doubted. The recapitulation’s flirtations with the future, Webern in particular, were relished as further development, for there was no doubting the profundity of either work or performance. After such Mahlerian intensity, the rondo finale necessarily struck a very different note. (The split Köchel numbering reflects its earlier composition, as a stand-alone piece, albeit in need of considerable revision for inclusion here.) It was definitely alla breve, its particular lightness of touch neither denied nor underlined, although the mysteries of its episodes ensured that victory was not too easily won; the music, rightly, retained its sense of enigma.

Piemontesi - Mozart, 13 July 2016

Wigmore Hall

Piano Sonata no.1 in C major, KV 279/189d
Piano Sonata no.2 in F major, KV 280/189e
Piano Sonata no.3 in B-flat major, KV 281/189f
Fantasia in C minor, KV 475
Piano Sonata no.14 in C minor, KV 457

Francesco Piemontesi (piano)

The Wigmore Hall’s Mozart Odyssey continued with four piano sonatas and a fantasia from Francesco Piemontesi. Piemontesi is a thoughtful artist; even when his way would not be mine, there can be no doubting the integrity of his performance. And so it proved here; although I had my doubts concerning aspects of the earlier sonatas, especially his insistence, at times, on playing them in a fashion more ‘Baroque’ than ‘Classical’ – umbrella stylistic terms that throw up more questions than they answer – Piemontesi offered his own performative justifications.

 

The first sonata, in C major, KV 279/189d, opened with an Allegro that was taken very fast indeed. I was intrigued and, to begin with, not a little perplexed by the way Piemontesi had right-hand arpeggios sound more like ornaments than fully-fledged elements of the melodic line; I had never thought of them like that, but on reflection, could imagine why someone might. He used very little pedal indeed, in a light, almost Glenn Gould-like performance (albeit with more affection than Gould was ever able to summon up for Mozart), this movement in particular often sounding Scarlatti-like. Its development section, however, proved instructive in the pianist’s highlighting, without exaggeration, how the material differed from (i.e., developed) what we had heard before. The Andante was, again, taken pretty fast. Nevertheless, it flowed rather than being rushed. I should not have minded a little more indulgence, especially when it came to quasi-vocal melodic leaps, but the legato was to die for, likewise some wondrous, hushed moments. If the lack of sentimentality in the finale was, in itself, again admirable, I sometimes longed for a more conventionally pianistic treatment, especially in the first group, the second yielding somewhat more, as did the development section.

 

The F major Sonata, next in Köchel’s catalogue, whichever version, immediately sounded, to my ears, better reconciled to the instrument. Perhaps that is partly the work itself, although other pianists (Barenboim, Uchida, et al.) might beg to differ. The first movement was not without its ‘Baroque’ or ‘pre-Classical’ elements – another can of worms from which I shall in cowardly fashion shy away – but why should there not be? Terraced dynamics, for instance, certainly have their place here. I admired Piemontesi’s refusal to tone down his fortes; if one has a modern piano, one should use it. The ravishing second-movement siciliano was given its full due, rhythmically, harmonically, offering the greatest pathos, sharply characterised. It was ‘vocal’ yes, sometimes in a well-nigh Gluckian way, but ultimately, incontestably instrumental. Piemontesi’s ear for the longer line proved impeccable too, without that in any sense shortchanging rhetorical gestures. Like the finale of its predecessor, the third movement proved Haydnesque, Piemontesi especially alert to its motivic dynamism.

 

There was, again, a sharp opposition between first and second subjects in the first movement of the B-flat major sonata. Was it too sharp? Perhaps. However, a stern development section, and a splendidly integrative recapitulation conveyed retrospective justification. The slow movement flowed, though not so quickly as that in the first sonata. It was poised, quite without a sense of being hurried, or harried; it subtly yielded too. Piemontesi’s navigation of competing tendencies in the finale dazzled; this was as convincing a feat of integration as I have heard in this music.

First edition of the C minor Fantasia (Artaria), closing bars

In the second half, we heard the great C minor Sonata, preceded, as it often is, by the Fantasia, here without a break – and indeed, without the final bars of the Fantasia (rather a good way of doing it, if one must). Piemontesi’s long-term harmonic ear (Furtwängler’s Fernhören) really came into its own here, the possibilities of the opening phrases almost audible at the outset. His legato touch, anything but unvariegated, helped with that too, of course. There was no doubting that this was music of quite another order when it came to emotional and intellectual weight. Mozart’s tour of the tonal horizons truly enthralled – and it all sounded, as great Mozart playing does, so easy! The first movement of the Sonata following on as it did registered as some kind of release in context, although the chiaroscuro afforded by the E-flat major of the second subject asserted different tonal priorities. Wisely, Piemontesi took the first but not the second repeat, the turn to the tonic minor in the recapitulation properly heartbreaking. And so, the music subsided. (Applause suggested some thought that the end of the Fantasia!) The slow movement, one of Mozart’s very greatest, emerged both as great instrumental scena and as something that could only ever have been conceived for, let alone realised by, the piano. Again, line and integration were beyond reproach; above all, they were felt as utterly necessary. The richness of Mozart’s harmonies suggested the C minor Piano Concerto, even Don Giovanni, whilst the turn to A-flat major inevitably brought to mind – as it always does to me under the fingers – the slow movement of Beethoven’s op.13. That section proved, quite properly, both contrast and intensification. The finale sounded, without melodrama, a note of unrelenting tragedy; even in the major mode, intensity of performance and awareness of context did their tragic work. Mozart’s music sounded, as it should, both close to and distinct from Beethoven.

Piemontesi - Mozart, 25 January 2016

Wigmore Hall

Fantasia in D minor, KV 397/385g

Piano Sonata in D major, KV 284/205b
Rondo in A minor, KV 511
Piano Sonata in A major, KV 331/300i

Francesco Piemontesi (piano)

 

Mozart will be 260 on 27 January. In seven days surrounding that birthday, I shall be attending no fewer than five concerts devoted to or including his music, both in London and in Salzburg. This Wigmore Hall recital from Francesco Piemontesi was the first; I shall end with another pianist, Radu Lupu, playing two of Mozart’s piano concertos. It was certainly an excellent beginning. There is, I think, nothing more difficult than to give an all-Mozart recital. Ten years ago, as part of a series of events I organised in Cambridge to commemorate the composer’s 250^th birthday, I gave such a recital, having returned to performing Mozart in public after burning my fingers badly (albeit metaphorically!) as a teenager and swearing I should never do so again. I was delighted to have done so – reasonably, I thought, at the time – but I can think of no sterner task I have set myself and doubt that I shall ever do so again.

Piemontesi most certainly should; indeed, as part of the Wigmore Hall’s ‘Mozart Odyssey’, he will do so again here as soon as 13 July. This programme, intelligently constructed, and equally intelligently performed, satisfied from beginning to end. D minor led to D major, Don Giovanni-like in the first half, and A minor led to its tonic major in the second. The D minor Fantasia makes for a splendid opening piece. (I say that not only because I chose it to open that aforementioned Cambridge recital!) Far too often today, pianists seem inhibited in playing Mozart on modern pianos. The results are rarely as dreadful as so-called ‘historically-informed’ performances by modern orchestras, to which the only reasonable response can be: ‘What on earth is the point of trying to make modern instruments sound like their ancient counterparts? You will not entirely succeed, and if that is what you want, why not use the latter in the first place?’ The problem is inhibition rather than greyness and downright grotesquerie; at best, we end up with prettified, Meissen china, Mozart, drained of its passion. Such was not the case here, for Piemontesi gave a full-bloodedly Romantic performance. Anyone who doubts Mozart’s Romanticism doubts Mozart, or does not know him at all. Quite rightly, full use was made of the sustaining pedal, not least at the very opening, Beethoven’s Tempest Sonata seemingly only a stone’s throw away. Moreover the element of performance, perhaps recalling the composer’s improvisatory or quasi-improvisatory practice was equally apparent; it was not difficult at all to imagine the composer himself having played like this at the keyboard. Like an operatic scena, this rumbled, raged, above all sang. So much for Joseph Kerman’s assertion, oft-quoted thereafter, that it is ‘almost impossible to play Mozart emotionally on a modern piano without sounding vulgar’. To be fair, he said ‘almost’, but even so. Here, like the Overture to Don Giovanni, and with a similarly abrupt conclusion to the concert ending to that (the first piece I conducted, as it happens), we experienced the wonder of this quite un-Beethovenian yet nevertheless - as E.T.A. Hoffmann understood - quintessentially Romantic journey from darkness to light.

Mozart’s piano sonatas remain absurdly underestimated by many. The old idea of them as ‘teaching pieces’ – yes, of course, they work wonders as teaching pieces, but that is a beginning, not an end – has yet to be eradicated. They perhaps give up their secrets less readily than the concertos, but many of us have learned most of what we fancy we know by playing the solo piano works of Bach and Mozart. The so-called ‘Dürnitz Sonata’ followed, in a reading with which I really could not find fault at all. (Not, I hasten to add, that I was trying to do so!) The Allegro was crisp, commanding, at times orchestral – although Piemontesi knew very well the difference between a piano suggesting an orchestra and an orchestra itself. Often, as here, the former can accomplish deeds that the latter cannot. He knew when to yield, too, at least as important, whilst ultimately retaining a forward-looking (or forward-hearing) impetus; without that, sonata form is nothing, a formula rather than a form. The Rondeau en Polonaise paid its homage, as had the Fantasia, to earlier keyboard music; I thought, not least following the Aurora Orchestra’s recent concert with John Butt, of the Bach sons. Yet there was no doubt whose operatic voice was taking flight here too. In the finale, Piemontesi showed a proper understanding of Classical variation form, all too often – like these sonatas themselves – underestimated, as if the Diabelli Variations and the Goldbergs were the only possibilities here. One needs an intimate acquaintance, emotional yet subtle, stylistically sensitive yet vividly performative, to attend to the demands of characterisation and the greater whole. This performance satisfied on all those counts.

 

At first I was slightly nonplussed by Piemontesi’s way with the great A minor Rondo. (Is it the composer’s single greatest work for solo piano? At the very least, there is nothing beyond it.) Less overtly Romantic than the performance of the Fantasia though it might have been, it actually proved all the more forward-looking. That is partly a matter of the material and Mozart’s chromatic, contrapuntal development of it. But a relatively – and I stress relatively – ‘objective’ approach, without taking that to extremes, was able to point the way to its constructivism, its proximity to the Schoenberg of the 1920s. It is not that the performance was somehow ‘unemotional’, but that it made one listen to process, to craft, and permitted the highly volatile emotional material to speak for itself.

The A major Sonata, KV 331, 300i, followed. Without underlining the fact, appearing again to let the music simply to ‘speak’, Piemontesi allowed one to appreciate the unusual qualities of a work that has not a single movement in sonata form, and which yet nevertheless feels very much as a sonata ‘should’. Again, the first movement variations displayed a fine balance between individual characterisation and longer-term planning. One almost did not notice the distinction of phrasing and touch – here, as elsewhere – because the pianist felt no need to draw attention to himself; however, on reflection, one knew that much had been done. The second movement Minuet and Trio were taken quite fast, but they did not sound unduly so; indeed, the Trio flowed like oil, to employ Mozart’s celebrated dictum. Piemontesi again showed, in the Rondo alla Turca, what the piano can actually accomplish better than an orchestra, whilst suggesting not only orchestral colours but also the spirit of an older instrument. We do not need a ‘percussion stop’, interesting though it might be occasionally to hear one; we need an intelligent performance, willing to use the means at our modern disposal.

Piemontesi - Mozart, Schubert, Chopin, and Debussy, 7 November 2012

Queen Elizabeth Hall

 

Mozart – Piano Sonata in D major, KV 284/205b

Schubert – Piano Sonata in A minor, D 537
Chopin – Barcarolle in F-sharp major, op.60
Debussy – Préludes, Book II

Francesco Piemontesi (piano)

 

I first heard Francesco Piemontesi last year, at the City of London Festival. In a not entirely dissimilar programme, though with no duplication, he had performed music by Chopin, Debussy, and Schumann. Chopin and Debussy remained for this International Piano Series concert, joined by Mozart and Schubert.

 

Mozart is the cruellest of masters. If Piemontesi did not emerge unscathed from the encounter, he nevertheless accrued some credit. The first movement of the D major sonata, KV 284/205b, opened in orchestral – if chamber orchestral – manner; one could imagine bright open strings. Terraced dynamics marked an interpretation on the cusp of Baroque and Classical, but there was more localised shading too, for instance in the generous shaping of the second subject. What I missed was something bolder, at least at times. Perhaps the tempo was a little fast; some passagework veered towards the inconsequential, though there was nothing to which one could violently object. Subtle variation in touch contributed greatly to a graceful reading of the slow movement, Piemontesi’s phrasing vocal and assured. Even by Mozart’s standards, the theme of the finale is treacherous in its deceptive simplicity. It was voiced sensitively with a keen ear for the composer’s harmonic shifts. The variations were, well, varied. Sometimes tone was brittle, as in a second variation that sounded closer to Scarlatti than to Mozart. Piemontesi could also be more efficient, as in the third, than seductive. Balanced against that, one could enjoy playfulness in the sixth, eighth, and ninth, the latter two delightfully Haydnesque, and Romantic tenderness in the seventh. And if the Adagio cantabile lacked warmth, there were winning contrasts at which one could smile in the succeeding twelfth and final variation.

 

Schubert’s first A minor sonata opened impressively indeed, Piemontesi showing himself willing to employ a considerably greater expressive range. The first movement proved bolder and more ‘naturally’ lyrical. And there was darkness at its developmental hear. That and the success of the movement as a whole rested on a sure understanding and communication of harmonic motion. Piemontesi did not sentimentalise the second movement and conveyed a sure sense of where it was heading. It was a little on the chilly side, though, bracingly so in the turn to the minor, less convincingly so otherwise. There was welcome clarity but a little more sense of song would have been welcome. Mood swings were powerfully brought home in the finale, though sometimes – only sometimes – the pianist could sound impetuous rather than darkly furious.

A surprise came after the interval. Expecting ‘Brouillards’ from Debussy’s second book of Préludes, I heard instead Chopin’s Barcarolle, obviously a late addition to the programme, since it was not listed in my booklet. Piemontesi gave it a forthright performance, with strong rhythmic and harmonic underpinning. There was not so much, however, in the way of charm.

 

The Préludes, when they came, enjoyed a noticeably different tone, the pianist seeming better attuned to Debussy’s sound-world and, perhaps surprisingly so, given the prosaic Chopin, to his poetry. Moreover, atmosphere did not obscure what I hesitatingly call the more ‘purely’ musical thought. Likewise, one could hear what was going on without any of the earlier chilliness. ‘La puerta del vino’ was dark and sultry, differently atmospheric from what had gone before; there was no all-purpose allegedly Debussyan haze. Rhythmic insistence and rubato were finely matched. If ‘Bruyères’ opened in rather plain-spoken fashion, it softened; soon chords genuinely sounded as if they emanated from an instrument ‘without hammers’. ‘“General Lavine” – excentric’ and the ‘Hommage à S. Pickwick Esq. P.P.M.P.C.’ were sharply etched, or perhaps I should say vividly painted, for there was nothing monochrome, nor for that matter pastel, about them. We benefited from a properly aristocratic tour of ‘Canope’ prior to the relative abstraction of ‘Tierces alternées,’ which might yet have stepped a touch further in the direction of the Etudes. The neo-Lisztian pyrotechnics of ‘Feux d’artifice’  were relished, but Piemontesi showed himself equally able to sing, as it were, between the notes. Debussy, as last year, proved the highlight of the recital.

City of London Festival: Francesco Piemontesi piano recital, 7 July 2011

St Mary Abchurch

Chopin – Prelude in C-sharp minor, op.45
Chopin – Mazurkas, op.59
Debussy – Préludes, Book I (selection)
Schumann – Kreisleriana, op.16


An especially welcome feature of this year’s City of London Festival is a series of early evening concerts (6 p.m.) featuring BBC New Generation Artists, all of which will subsequently be broadcast on Radio 3. This piano recital was given by the young Swiss pianist, Francesco Piemontesi, about whom I had heard a number of good reports. On the basis of the present performance, I hope and expect that we shall hear much more from him.

The opening Chopin C-sharp minor Prelude took its time, which is not to say that it was sluggish; far from it, for Piemontesi seemed to be framing it as a prelude to the programme as a whole, communicating joy and wonder in its harmonic revelations, closer to the C major Prelude from Book One of the Forty-Eight than I can recall hearing before. Yet it was not all harmony: Piemontesi demonstrated beyond doubt that he knew how to deliver a melting Chopin melodic line. The blurring acoustic of St Mary Abchurch did the two op.59 Mazurkas no favours. Though lovingly explored, there were occasions, especially during the first of the pair, when the rhythm – this is partly a matter of accent too – sounded closer to a relatively slow waltz than to a mazurka. A touch more rubato would not have gone amiss either.

Danseuses de Delphes received an impressive performance indeed, its cumulative power undeniable yet never exaggerated, founded upon a marriage of secure harmonic understanding, underpinned by accomplished Debussy pedalling, and finely spun legato, negating the piano’s irksome – in this context – hammers. Piemontesi seemed to highlight the post-Wagnerian qualities of Debussy’s harmonic writing, the legacy of Parsifal in particular. Voiles and Minstrels proceeded in not entirely dissimilar vein. The pianist’s emphasis upon harmonic revelation in time, connecting back to the opening Chopin Prelude, was welcome indeed, and never less than thought-provoking, but lightness of touch, which need not entail skating over those progressions, might sometimes have been more to the fore. Maurizio Pollini’s recent account of Voiles managed more fully both to provoke and to satisfy, to scintillate too, but it is surely evidence of Piemontesi’s artistry that one might even consider such a comparison.

The opening two movements of Kreisleriana impressively portrayed Schumann’s dialectic between Florestan and Eusebius, Piemontesi’s sure command of rhythm enabling him to unleash and to underpin both fire and fantasy. The second, ‘Sehr innig und nicht zu rasch,’ acquired an almost hypnotic quality, yet equally important, almost a counterbalance, was the palpable sincerity of the composer’s voice as sounded by Piemontesi. Later on, the acoustic – and, one sensed, perhaps the pianist’s inclination – tended to favour poetic introspection over passionate volubility. Faster passages when louder could sometimes become mere washes of sound, though the impishness of passages in the fifth and final movements came across very well, the darkness of the latter too. The magic, however, of Piemontesi’s Schumann as dreamer cast quite a spell, revived in an utterly rapt encore account of Der Dichter spricht, whose questing harmonic exploration, simpler perhaps but equally powerful, returned us anew to the virtues of that opening Chopin Prelude.

The recital will be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 on Friday 22 July at 1 p.m. I hope that the increasingly raucous sounds from outside the church – could the adjacent wine bar not have requested that its well-heeled City patrons remain indoors for but an hour? – will intrude less than they did on the evening itself.