I went uptown to Bruce Levingston’s piano recital, “Points of Departure,” at Carnegie Hall the other night, and, as usual, he put on a great show. Though I was all the way back in the last row, and hence Bruce was but a tiny speck on the distant stage the acoustics were wonderful. Several of our Chelsea Hotel friends showed up, and I didn’t notice any of them leaving early, so they must have had a good time as well. (Out of delicacy, I’ll refrain from naming them, as certain of them may have been involved in romantic trysts and/or political intrigues of a highly clandestine nature.)
Anyway, the first piece, and the one I liked best, was “Fur Alina” by the composer Arvo Part. Minimal and straightforward, tinkling like fairy bells in the moonlight, Levingston played the piece with an amazingly delicate touch: this is the music of childhood, simple, redolent of nostalgia. Levingston showed a quiet confidence in his own abilities and emotions, and was willing to bare them for us all, assured of their universality. I fell under his spell.
The Scarlatti piece Levingston played next was a perfect complement to the Part (and one could see how it had been an influence on the later composer): also delicate, but more upbeat, it set the stage for what was to come. The Rihm piece, the New York premiere of his “Brahmsliebewaltzer,” began sweetly and then became more strident: a walk by the seashore morphing into a journey of discovery.
The next piece was the world premiere of a tour de force called “Departures and Arrivals” by Sebastian Currier. Undoubtedly the highlight of the evening (together with the Part selection), Levingston said he had asked Currier to write him a short piece, and the guy just basically went totally overboard and wrote this long six part work. Nevertheless, Levingston heroically rose to the occasion. And I mean that almost literally, for I found the piece highly agitating and somewhat creepy, composed as it was of alternating movements of disquieting jingling followed by abrupt, jarring cords. I kept thinking of a slasher film, where long stretches of suspenseful foreboding are suddenly punctuated by a moment of extreme violence: the music set me on pins and needles, only to pounce--and sink the knife in the jugular! I disliked this piece at first, but toward the end I was forced to accord it a sort of grudging respect, especially after the fourth movement, “a transformation,” which, although by far the heaviest and most sinister, tied the whole thing together, justifying the emotional upheaval it had (seemingly senselessly) wrought upon the listener, and propelling it to it’s surprisingly sweet and ultimately restorative conclusion.
Well, how do you follow that? Despite the break that intervened, I was so emotionally drained by the Currier piece that I must admit I didn’t have much left for the next selection, the world premier of Charles Wuorinen’s “Heart Shadow.” The piece was a little too complex for me, throwing in as it did everything but the kitchen sink (even the theme from Goldfinger!), and I never could quite get a handle on it. There was certainly nothing objectionable about it, and Levingston played the selection expertly, but it’s something I would have to listen to a few times to really appreciate.
The concert closed with a couple of more reassuring pieces by Debussy and Liszt, which Levingston played to perfection.
In addition to his virtuoso piano skills, Levingston is a fine speaker, composed and welcoming, and demonstrating an infectious intellectual engagement with the music. I liked how he put the various composers and their works into context with each other. He’s obviously dedicated to the close study of what he’s doing as well as the technique, which is quite helpful for me in understanding where he’s going with the music. The program for the evening also contained useful notes, penned by Bruce himself, on each of the composers.
Alas, I must admit I was a bit remiss and didn’t stick around after the show to fully gauge the crowd’s reaction—they did give Levingston a standing ovation, however, if that’s any indication. -- Ed Hamilton
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