Yesterday Martha Argherich was playing List Piano Concerto and Chopin
e-moll concerto, with Sinfonia Varsovia and truly neurotic Alexandre
Rabinovitch.

I was sitting 6 meters away.  It was in the great hall of Warsaw Opera
House and it was of course acoustic suicide as the sound had no reverbation
at all - totally dry theater-like acoustics but the concert was very very
interesting.

Martha was so nervous during List that she blew it completely.  Of course
it was technically perfect but she was completely absent-minded and was
just playing notes with notorious dynamic violations.  She could not get
herself concentrated enough to play pianos and she was all the time falling
into mezzoforte and forte at the same time hitting upon the keybord too
hard and so too flat.  When she wasn't playing she was nervously pushing up
and down the pedal and her hands lying on her legs were shaking.  List
was therefore very nervous hectic and overdone.  After the break she
became Chopin concerto with masterly played opening chords.  Although
still too strong for me, they were promising a marvelous continuation.
The whole first part of the concerto though, which score requires a big
concentration, was to my regret again simply played through as her mind was
still somewhere far away from the concert hall.  She calmed down for the
first time in the second part and she played with unrivaled brilliance
although from time to time she couldn't withhold her horses.  Unfortunately
all the second part peace and contemplation was still not there.
Moderately calm she became the third part.  Her thoughts came back to the
concert hall, the sparkle was back in the eye and she even started smiling
to herself.  And then it was a really moving playing.  Precise, with a
fresh view on the old score, naturally original without showing off and
banality.  I have heard many fine flavoures I have not heard in this
concerto before.

Most striking and pleasant however was an absolute technical masterity.
Of course in the first Chopin part there were two or three bad notes but
there was no trace of a slightest effort.  Even a glimpse on her was making
it obvious that keyboard was simply incorporated with her hands and the
movement was as natural as our own when we put butter on a piece of bread.
She was there and music was there - no middle medium.  Of course it all
finished with a standing ovation of the whole house.

The whole concert was quite nervous and of unbalanced nature but the encore
was just divine, jaw-dropping, leaving people speakless for the couple of
seconds.  It was Scarlatti d-minor sonata.  I have never heard something
like this, unpossible to depict finest precision, sense of dynamics, - a
purest bliss from the very beginning to the end.  I'm sure I will not hear
something similar for a long time.

It is truly great and truly troubled pianist, just as the legend says.

Maciej Dziekiewicz
[log in to unmask]