S2.E84. Grieg Piano Concerto.

Classical Music by Grieg

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Transcript

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Welcome back to Perfect Pitch with Nick Healy Hutchinson and his fresh approach to the world of classical music. Whether you're an expert or a beginner, old or young, Perfect Pitch has something for everyone.

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A few weeks ago, we listened to Schumann's only piano concerto. For decades, this piece has been paired on record, then cassette, then CD with Greek piano concerto, written just over 20 years later in 1868. There are only two obvious reasons for this. The first is that both are in the key of A minor, but the more relevant one is that in both cases the composer didn't write another one. So it's an obvious and convenient pairing. Stylistically, they have absolutely nothing in common. They do open with a similar announcement with timpani and piano, but musically, they are poles apart. What stands Greeks aside from almost all in the repertoire, certainly from late Mozart through Beethoven, Stroppard, Mendelssohn, and later Stasens, Brahms, Tsarkovski, and Reichmandov, is that it's a piece which makes no attempt to get to our soul or tucker the heartstrings. This is a work which finds its roots in Norwegian folk music. And as such, it's quite simply about out and out of fun, helped throughout by a bunch of some really delightful and happy melodies. So don't expect to be moved by it, but do expect to feel better for hearing it. The fact that it was his early concerto reminds me of a silly observation I made a number of years ago. Here in the UK, there's an annual competition on our television screens called Universal Challenge. It involves about 18 teams of four students who battle each other over several months. The variety of subjects is a mess, but there's always a music crowd, which itself is also varied. I remember one occasion where the answer correctly produced by one of the students was the green piano concerto. Now nobody expects a question master to know the answer to every single question. That would be completely ridiculous. But the one thing you must not do in that position is to give even the slightest impression that you might know more about the stuff than you actually do, because it's so easy to spot. On this occasion, having been given the right answer, he wasn't sufficiently satisfied and went on to ask, which one? Unsurprisingly, the student looked a little bit mused, but after a brief pause replied, A minor. Thinking he got the upper hand, the question master rather triumphantly announced, Correct. But there was a part of me wishing that the student had been just a tiny bit more quick-witted, and when asked which one, I instead replied, You found another one, and put him back in his box. We're going to listen to the concerto in full, and this is another of those pieces which has been recorded by all of the laundry. But I particularly enjoy this one with the late Aradu Lupu, accompanied by some very lovely playing from the London Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Andre Previn. There are a few things which stood out for me. The first is his resistance to avoid taking too fast. The next was the softness of the tone. Maybe that's something to do with the piano he selected, but it's so refreshing not to hear it being belted out. And then, of course, the lightness, freshness, and playfulness of Lupu's touch. The second movement, which moves without a break into the third, makes you feel like you might be in a forest, surrounded by a cacophony of bird song. And there's some especially fine playing from the woodwind and the principal horn. The recording is over fifty years old, but has it ever stood the test of time? Green's piano concerto, that's the one in A minor, is played here by Radu Lupu with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Andre Preppin.

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That's it for this week. Nick will be back again soon. Please rate and comment on any of the previous episodes, and if you like what you hear, take a moment to press the follow button, as it helps to spread the word.