Concert Review: Evgeny Kissin @ Carnegie Hall, May 4, 2013

What is the magic – what is the spell, the art - that invites an audience to clap ceaselessly, continuing long after an artist has indicated a desire to conclude the programme, begging for another encore, and another, and another? Is it solely the effect of the concert, is it the audience's historical connection to the artist, is it simply the choreography of the bows, the reluctance of the artist contrasting with those who dash out on stage at the appropriate moment to ensure the opportunity to play an encore or two? The organizers of Evgeny Kissin's brilliant Friday-night recital at Carnegie Hall, clearly knew what to expect: the concert was scheduled for 7pm, leaving ample time after the two-hour programme for the enraptured audience to request more, and more, and more.

From the moment I tried to get tickets for this concert, I sensed something special in the air. I had become Kissin's fan after seeing his encore from his famous BBC proms recital on youtube, Beethoven's Rage Over A Lost Penny. (I had been searching for a video answer to the question, “What is a song that makes you laugh?”) As we all know, youtube's quality of sound is certainly missing splendour, but the videos offers front-row seats, and give the contours of the music very well nonetheless. In Kissin's fingers, the delightful humour of the piece in all its drama – the making of a mountain from a molehill, and again a molehill from a mountain – sparkled with sincerity and life. In early March, I looked up his upcoming concerts, found this recital, and was baffled by Carnegie's quixotic message instead of ticket prices: "Limited Availability, Please Call CarnegieCharge.” I called CarnegieCharge, learning that tickets had sold out immediately upon their release in August. My chance to attend would mean lining up on the day of the concert, when a number of “public availability” tickets would go on sale at the box office for $10 each. The box office opens at 11:00am; the time to arrive is a free-for-all.

What stardust drives people to line up at 5:30am, to wait in line for 5 ½ hours, beyond the wish for certainty to hear their artist of choice? I too arrived early, at 9:30am, the first time I have stood in line for tickets since my student days. I chatted with my neighbour, a very nice Russian Carnegie Hall tour guide, and we took turns saving the other's spot in line, while I stood in the nearby sunshine to warm up, while she went to get us hot tea. The line wasn't long, but the stack of tickets was shorter. The 5:30am people received them, as did everyone up through the 8am crowd. The remaining thirty-odd people were out of luck. 

... Except me. - ! By some oxymoronic fluke of fate ... I continued to wait in line for the ticket window after my neighbours had already given up and gone home, to inquire about when stage seats become available, so that I would know for next time – whereupon the salesperson looked up tonight's seating availability and found exactly one free stage seat. Of course I bought it! (Clearly, it was meant for me! I was quite jubilant.)

I was excited for my seat's youtube-like closeness, as well as to, ahem, share the stage with Evgeny Kissin! - yet I was happy when it mysteriously turned out that my ticket was actually for a balcony seat, and on the left side too. It feels a bit like I'm dreaming, to recount that; I cannot yet explain how, with solely one ticket's availability, its location could have been non-unique. But no matter, the sound in my part of the balcony was ideal, exquisite. Perhaps I had the perfect nearness to the beautiful arcing of the ceiling, which gently invited my eyes to wander along it to the gilded columns of the stage, in complementary repose.

I was surrounded by Russian-speakers, most of them old enough to have witnessed the exceptional rise of Kissin's career, and who speak of Genya (or modernly, Zhenya) the nickname by which he is affectionately known, very much as one of their own, almost as a young family member. The level of perfume in my row may have been more than I am accustomed to, but it did not eclipse the palpable anticipation. When Kissin sat down to play his first encore, my neighbour confided to me excitedly, “Last time he play five!” Tonight, he began with Melodie from Orfeo ed Euridice (Gluck-Sgambati), almost too simple after the powerful Liszt Hungarian Rhapsody preceding it, but a poignant farewell to the dedicatee of the concert, Kissin's father Igor, who had passed away nearly a year ago, honoured by a picture and the dedication in the programme booklet.

The programme notes aptly noted the 50-year span of tonight's recital: Haydn Sonata no.49 in Eb major, Beethoven Sonata no.32 (Op.111) in C minor, 4 Schubert Impromptus, and the Liszt 12^th Hungarian Rhapsody. Even though I may well have been the only violinist in Carnegie tonight, I have heard this quintessential piano repertoire many times, for I grew up playing the piano too, and love its gems dearly. (Not seeing any familiar fellow “highly-strung” players tonight, would never happen to me at, say, a Frank Peter Zimmerman concert, for I've been living in New York for a long time now. Perhaps these absent violinists accounted for the surprisingly many empty seats, which I can only imagine were bought in August before patrons had finalized conflicting plans this 3^rd of May. Someone ought to tell them about the 5:30am people. And about how much they missed out!

The Schubert Impromptus, like the Gluck Melodie, work beautifully as an homage, and stood most gracefully on this programme. To my ear, they give a balm to loss, an understanding but a hope, they console without reference, communicate of life worth living, even with tears. Kissin played them truly exquisitely; their souls lived and lit the hall with extraordinary grace. 

The Haydn Sonata, a late work, was perfect, characteristically witty yet upright, beautiful but never indulgent. Perhaps because I was least familiar with this Sonata, I occasionally wished for a shade more improvisatory nature, a little more time between phrases, to make me guess what might be next. Had Kissin decided to apply his great compositional talent and improvise on the themes in a completely different direction, I could well have been fooled, and I think Haydn would have enjoyed it! Sadly, as I learned from youtube interviews, Kissin stopped composing already in his teenage years, perhaps overwhelmed by all the great already existing repertoire, the shadow of history too strong. His early pieces, however, clearly show his great inventiveness, and ability to speak wittily and interestingly in his own musical language. One can only hope he'll pick it up again someday soon.

The Op.111 is the last piano sonata Beethoven wrote. It treads the finest of lines between the feelings of almost, almost touching the stars, and falling in an endless precipice. The greatest extremes, and everything connecting them, of Beethoven's most mature temperament are embodied here. One theme that constantly permeates is the faith and philosophy written in his Heiligenstadt testament: emerging from the depths of despair, and contemplation of suicide, a reaffirmation of faith in life, hope, and joy. In Kissin's interpretation, and I feel it is greatly to his credit, I did not know how the story of the sonata would end. The variations lingered in their sunny moments, but just as much might have remained forever lost in their searching and inconsolable ones.

How does a performer – never mind the composer – maintain self-preservation, in light of the constant close proximity to these deepest of emotions? One pianist friend of mine has said that feeling everything in these most profound works would require being carried out on a stretcher after the performance. There is certainly an element of pure concentration on execution that happens with repeated practice and performance, but nevertheless, our job as performers is to communicate the humanity of the piece to the truest and fullest degree we can, which means feeling it all. Thus I will always be moved, weeping internally, when I play Bach's Ciaccona. With Kissin, one has the feeling that he never holds back – and in fact, it is this sincerity that drew me so strongly to his playing in the first place. What struck me in particular was how present, contemporary and relevant his interpretive language is. He spoke guilelessly, as himself, to us. Especially in the Op.111, I had the feeling that Beethoven's life is here now, that Phillip Glass exists in the just barely tonally-directed variations, that there is no boundary between today, and inflections from two hundred years ago. Time in all its cliché stood still. And that is true artistry, to savour the proverbial moment, to let us feel this moment most intensely, most vibrantly, most alive.

After this immense two-hour programme, I was impressed at Kissin's energy to play a second encore (Liszt's Transcendental Etude #10 in F minor), and, upon ceaseless clapping, a third: Liszt's transcription of Schubert's The Trout, both of which I enjoyed very much. (I had not heard the Trout transcription before, and found the rhythmic changes between it and Schubert song and quintet interesting, if odd.) It was the perfect mood to end on, and yet the audience kept clapping, well after I'd stopped, certain it had crossed the point of bad manners. Perhaps they were egging him on due to expectancies fuelled by his great generosity previously - his Carnegie record appears to be twelve encores in 2007 - for even the NY Times review lists him as having played a “mere” three encores. 

Regardless, it had been a wonderful evening. He bowed in his unique manner, waiting a long time before a full but sudden bow: slowly, to the house, and then to his stage audience, and then – he exited as politely as was possible without fulfilling the desire for a fourth encore. 

His fans will just have to try to make it to Carnegie again for his concert this Sunday, May 19 at 3pm, with the MET orchestra. That concert has also long been sold out. Anyone have an extra ticket?