PoLINA LEsCHENKo

Portland Piano International
Polina Leschenko
Sunday, January 11, 2009 • 4:00 pm
Monday, January 12, 2009 • 7:30 pm
Newmark Theatre • Portland, Oregon
Program
Haydn
Sonata in E-flat Major, Hob. XVI:52
Allegro: Moderato
Adagio
Finale: Presto
Medtner
Sonata Reminiscenza in A minor, Op. 38, from Forgotten Melodies I
Brahms
Variations on a Theme by Paganini, Op. 35, Book II
Intermission
Tchaikovsky
Valse Sentimentale in F minor, Op. 51, No. 6
Valse in A-flat Major, Op. 40, No. 9
Rachmaninoff
Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor, Op. 36
Allegro Agitato
Non allegro — Lento
L’istesso tempo ­— Allegro molto
Program subject to change
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Polina Leschenko
Polina Leschenko was born
in 1981 in St. Petersburg
into a family of musicians,
and began playing the piano
under her father’s guidance at
the age of six. She made her
solo debut at the age of eight
with the Leningrad Symphony
Orchestra in St. Petersburg. She
studied with Sergei Leschenko,
Vitali Margulis, Pavel Gililov,
Alexandre RabinovitchBarakovsky, and Christopher
Elton. At the age of sixteen she
received her Higher Diploma
with the greatest distinction
from the Royal Conservatory
in Brussels.
Polina Leschenko has worked
with The Hallé, London Mozart
Players, Scottish Chamber,
Bournemouth Symphony,
Russian National, Orquesta
de Euskadi, and Australian
Chamber Orchestras. In January
2008 she performed Weber’s
Konzertstück (which had been
part of the program for the
The Hallé Orchestra’s very first
concert) for the Orchestra’s
one-hundred-fiftieth birthday
celebration. David Fanning
wrote in the Telegraph,
“Equally breathtaking…was the
young Russian pianist Polina
Leschenko, who produced a
dazzling firework display in the
Weber Konzertstück.” She has
given major recitals in Vienna,
Minnesota, Atlanta, and New
York. In the 2006–07 season,
Ms. Leschenko was the Palais
des Beaux Arts’ candidate for
the ECHO Rising Stars series.
She appeared (along with cellist
Christian Poltéra) throughout
Europe: in Vienna, Salzburg,
London, Amsterdam, Paris, and
Brussels; as well as at Carnegie
Hall in New York.
This season’s solo recital tour
includes performances in
Cincinnati, Milan, Utrecht,
Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw,
and Vienna’s Konzerthaus; a
South American tour with The
Hallé Orchestra and Sir Mark
Elder; and performances of
Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto
No. 1 with Heinrich Schiff and
the Bruckner Orchester Linz,
and with The Hallé Orchestra.
Ms. Leschenko also performs
in a series of chamber music
concerts in the United Kingdom
and Poland with the Britten
Sinfonia, including a Wigmore
Hall lunchtime concert in
December.
An accomplished and admired
chamber musician, Ms.
Leschenko has performed
in many festivals, including
Aldeburgh, Risor, West Cork,
Moritzburg, and Musiktage
Mondsee. She performs
regularly with artists including
2
Heinrich Schiff, Ivry Gitlis,
Christian Poltéra, Mark
Drobinsky, Julia Fischer,
Alexander Sitkovetsky, Natalie
Clein, and Priya Mitchell.
Polina Leschenko has recorded
a debut CD for EMI, in the
series Martha Argerich Presents,
that includes works by Liszt,
Chopin, Kreisler/Rachmaninov,
Brahms, and Bach/Feinberg.
Gramophone described her
as having “technical dexterity
in abundance, and signs of a
major artist in the making.” She
recorded a well-received disc
of Prokofiev chamber music
with Martha Argerich, Christian
Poltéra, and Roby Lakatos for
Avanticlassic. Her latest disc —
a Liszt recital (including the B
minor Sonata) — was released
in May 2007 (Avanticlassic).
Martine Dumont-Mergeay
wrote in La Libre Belgique
in 2007: “Polina Leschenko
has matured without having
lost any of her freedom. Now
Meet
the
even more inspired, she turns
her wonderful talents to a
brilliant, almost improvisatory
reading of the Liszt repertoire.
Beautifully acknowledging
Bach, Busoni, and Gounod’s
Liszt transcriptions in the first
half of the disc, she then offers
a unique and personal version
of the Sonata: a visionary
reading full of lucidity.” The
disc has won several awards:
a Choc du Monde de la
Musique, Pizzicato magazine’s
Supersonic, and a Joker
from the Belgian magazine
Crescendo.
Program Notes
Franz Joseph Haydn
(Born March 31, 1732, in Rohrau,
Austria; died May 31, 1809,
in Vienna)
Sonata in E-flat Major, Hob.
XVI:52
Franz Joseph Haydn’s long and
prolific career as a composer
began in the murky transition
from high Baroque to Classical,
and ended on the cusp of
the Romantic period. His
significant contributions to
Classical forms led him to be
called both the Father of the
Symphony and Father of the
String Quartet. Though Haydn
was born into a humble family
(son of a wheelwright and a
cook), his parents recognized
Artist!
Join Polina Leschenko in the
lobby immediately following the
concert where she will be happy to
autograph copies of her recordings,
available for purchase courtesy of
Classical Millennium.
3
his exceptional musical talent,
apprenticing him at age six to
a choirmaster in Hainburg. He
quickly learned to play violin
and harpsichord, and was
frequently heard as a treble
soloist in the Hainburg choir.
In 1740 his singing caught
the attention of the master of
the choirboys at St. Stephen’s
Cathedral in Vienna, and he
spent the next nine years as
a musician at St. Stephen’s,
absorbing Vienna’s musical
culture. From 1749 he worked
as a freelancer, including
work as accompanist-valet
to the composer Nicholas
Porpora who taught him the
fundamentals of composition.
Haydn had no solid early
training in music theory, and
so taught himself counterpoint,
partly by studying Carl Philip
Emmanuel Bach’s work.
By 1753 Haydn’s compositions
began to gain public acclaim,
and he noticed that pieces
he gave away to friends were
being published and sold
in local music shops. He
acquired his first noble patrons,
and in 1761 was offered the
fantastic opportunity to serve
as Kapellmeister to the house
of Esterházy. He served the
Esterházy princes (Paul Anton,
and then Nikolaus I) for nearly
thirty years. Haydn’s musical
aesthetic and expressive
vocabulary evolved over
the years, but his work is
characterized by a seemingly
OlgaKern
endless flow of lively invention,
and by a pervasive sense of
humor — his consistent irony
and wit are unrivaled in the
classical genre.
Although Haydn was not
known as a virtuoso performer,
the keyboard was central to
his creative process and to
his output as a composer.
The style, action, and tonal
I n t e r n a t i o n a l
Sunday,February22,4:00pm
Monday,Febuary23,7:30pm
NewmarkTheatre
“Inthisstageinhercareer,herplayingis
brilliant,glassy,supremelyaggressiveand
dazzlinglyvirtuosicintheHorowitzmanner.”
The Washington Post
ProgramincludestheChopinSonatasinCminor,Op.4;
B-flatminor,Op.35;andBminor,Op.58
Forticketscall503.228.1388oranyTicketmasteroutlet www.portlandpiano.orgTicketPrices$27-$42
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possibilities of the keyboard
changed during his lifetime,
and he gracefully navigated
from harpsichord to clavichord
to fortepiano. Haydn wrote
nearly sixty solo sonatas for
keyboard, forty keyboard trios,
and a number of incidental
pieces. Haydn’s keyboard
music was intended for private
or salon performance, and often
written for and dedicated to
women who were his students
and patrons.
The sonata in E-flat Major
is Haydn’s final sonata for
keyboard, and an excellent
example of Haydn’s late
musical aesthetic. The
opening Allegro presents a
beautifully developed, majestic
theme with great attention
to structural details that tie
the movement together with
splendid coherence. The
Adagio is more melancholy
than Haydn’s slow movements
usually are, and the harmonies
and sonority are reminiscent
of early Beethoven. Haydn’s
famous sense of humor usually
presents itself most clearly in
his finales, and this sonata is no
exception: a delightful closing
Presto consistently presents
motives that hesitantly interrupt
themselves rhythmically before
dashing off with comically
excessive exuberance.
Nikolai Medtner (Born January 5, 1880, in Moscow;
died November 13, 1951,
in London)
Sonata Reminiscenza, in A minor,
Op. 38, from Forgotten Melodies I
Nikolai Medtner, described by
Rachmaninoff as “the greatest
composer of our time,” was
born in Moscow, and entered
the Moscow Conservatory at
the age of ten, graduating in
1900 after taking the Anton
Rubinstein prize.
Although his talents as a
pianist were considered second
only to Rachmaninoff’s, he
turned away from a virtuoso
performer’s career in order to
focus on composition. All of
his compositions feature the
piano, for which he developed
a unique idiom. Medtner’s
works are less frequently
played than those of his
contemporaries Rachmaninoff
and Scriabin, due partly to
the extraordinary technical
and conceptual dedication
he requires of the performer.
Many of Medtner’s melodies
are heartfelt and penetrating
in the late-Romantic style,
intriguingly juxtaposed
against his highly complex
thematic developments, dense
polyphonic counterpoint, and
intellectual restlessness.
Medtner stayed in Russia
long after the Revolution,
5
though he began to expose
his works to a broader public
in 1924 when Rachmaninoff
organized a concert tour of
the United States and Canada.
In 1936 Medtner settled in
England, where his music
was held in high regard. In
1949 the Maharaja of Mysore
(an honorary fellow of Trinity
College of Music) founded a
Medtner Society dedicated to
recording all of the composer’s
works. Medtner’s health was
failing, but he managed to
record several of his major
compositions before his death
in 1951.
The Sonata Reminiscenza in A
minor (also known as the Tenth
Sonata) is the opening of a set
of eight pieces called Forgotten
Melodies (First Cycle)
composed between 1918 and
1920. This lyrical sonata is
one of Medtner’s best-known
pieces, a single movement
anchored by a recurring theme
of wistful tenderness flowing
into passages of passionate
declamatory power.
Johannes Brahms
(Born May 7, 1833, in Hamburg,
Germany; died April 3, 1897,
in Vienna)
Variations on a Theme by Paganini,
Op. 35, Book II
A meticulous craftsman and
notorious perfectionist who
destroyed as many of his
own works as he published,
Johannes Brahms chose to
stand in opposition to the new
German School of Romanticism
headed by Wagner and Liszt.
While Brahms’s music has
the emotional warmth of the
Romantics, his emotional selfdisclosures are supported by
Classical and even Baroque
structure and style, making
his moments of unguarded
expression more poignant by
contrast. Brahms tends to be
a deeply reflective composer,
and the word autumnal is often
applied even to his early works.
Brahms had his first music
lessons from his father, who
played double-bass. His early
study of the cello was cut short
when his teacher ran off with his
instrument. He began to apply
himself seriously to the piano at
the age of seven, and became
an accomplished performer; in
later life he often played his own
works, and he was the soloist
at the premieres of his first and
second piano concertos.
When Brahms was twenty,
he was introduced to Robert
Schumann, who immediately
became Brahms’s greatest
admirer and champion.
Schumann published an
article in which he declared
that Brahms was “destined to
give ideal expression to the
times.” The Schumann family
became the emotional center of
Brahms’s life. Brahms developed
a deep and lifelong attachment
to Robert’s wife, pianist and
composer Clara Schumann,
who was fourteen years older
than Brahms. After Schumann
was confined to a sanatorium
in 1854, Brahms became the
primary communicator between
Clara and Robert, and took on
many responsibilities of the
Schumann household. Although
the relationship between
Brahms and Clara was probably
platonic, it was emotionally
passionate on both sides.
Brahms never married, and
he died less than a year after
Clara’s death.
The piano idiom of Brahms is
unique; unlike his rival Liszt,
whose virtuoso music for the
piano sounds as difficult to
play as it actually is, Brahms’s
piano music is far more quietly
demanding, requiring nuanced
attention from the pianist.
One of Brahms’s greatest
talents lay in his ability to
develop a simple theme into
imaginative textures, using
broken-chord figuration,
innovative appoggiaturas, and
deceptively complex rhythms.
The full sonority of the piano is
exploited, though the music is
frequently less texturally dense
than that of many Romantic
composers.
The two books of the Opus 35
Paganini Variations, published
in 1866, are entitled Studies,
and each set of fourteen pieces
explores piano technique and
expression. The variations in
each Book do not develop
consecutively (unlike the
Handel Variations, which were
conceived with a progressive
structure and climax). The
Variations were inspired by
the virtuoso pianist Karl Tausig,
whom Brahms met in Vienna in
1862.
The theme is Niccolò Paganini’s
well-known Caprice No. 24
in A minor for violin, which
Brahms develops with a broad
range of colors and moods.
Book II contains several
ingenious miniatures: the
deceptively simple-sounding
Variation No. 2, which presents
the pianist with the challenge
of a legato melody entirely in
parallel octaves; Variation No.
6, a whimsical, chromatic,
fleeting scherzo; Variation
No. 7, an exercise in complex
syncopation; and Variation
No. 13, which shimmers with
echoes of Chopin.
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
(Born May 7, 1840, in Votkinsk,
Russia; died November 6, 1893,
in St. Petersburg)
Valse Sentimentale in F minor, Op. 51, No. 6
Valse in A-flat Major, Op. 40,
No. 9
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was
born in the small town of
Votkinsk in 1840, and died
in somewhat mysterious
circumstances in St. Petersburg
in 1893, probably from cholera
due to drinking unboiled
water (possibly intentionally),
though some scholars believe
he was poisoned to prevent
the revelation of an illicit
relationship with a member of
the Imperial family.
Tchaikovsky’s musical talent
was evident by the time he
was four. His parents did not
want him to pursue a career in
music, though they continued
to support his private music
lessons while he prepared for
a career as a civil servant at
the School of Jurisprudence. In
1861, after three years in the
civil service, Tchaikovsky began
to take music theory classes
through the Russian Musical
Society, and the next year, after
asking for his father’s support,
he entered the St. Petersburg
Conservatory, where he was
offered a teaching post after his
graduation.
Tchaikovsky found himself in
philosophical and aesthetic
opposition to a group of
nationalist composers, who
felt that his music was too
traditional and not sufficiently
Russian. Tchaikovsky himself
freely admitted his love for
Western musical influences
— calling Mozart “a musical
Christ,” and memorizing Bizet’s
Carmen in his admiration for its
charm and lack of pretension.
However, Tchaikovsky’s
music is inherently Russian,
as Stravinsky recognized
when he said: “Tchaikovsky’s
music, which does not
appear specifically Russian
to everybody, is more often
profoundly Russian than music
which has long since been
awarded the facile label of
Muscovite picturesqueness…
Tchaikovsky drew
unconsciously from the true,
popular sources of our race.”
Tchaikovsky’s solo piano output
consists of two sonatas, and
an array of salon works that
are sometimes technically
challenging, but which focus
more on felicities of melody,
harmony, and phrasing. The
Valse Sentimentale and Valse
in A-flat Major are two fine
examples of the lyricism and
grace that make Tchaikovsky
one of the best-loved Romantic
composers.
Sergei Rachmaninoff
(Born April 1, 1873, near
Novgorod; died March 28, 1943,
in Beverly Hills)
Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor, Op. 36
The brilliant pianist and
composer Sergei Rachmaninoff
was born in Russia, near
Novgorod, and emigrated to
America in 1918. Although
Rachmaninoff was a twentiethcentury composer, the
emotional center of his music
remained rooted in the lateRomantic period, anchored by
concepts of lyrical expression
such as those exemplified by
his early mentor Tchaikovsky.
Acclaimed as a virtuoso
concert pianist, Rachmaninoff
was always self-doubting as a
composer, suffering periods of
writer’s block. Public reception
of his works varied wildly,
from pioneering exposure
by Vladimir Horowitz, to a
dismissive article in the 1954
edition of The Grove Dictionary
of Music and Musicians
predicting that his “artificial
and gushing tunes” were “not
likely to last.”
Rachmaninoff knew that he
was out of step with modernist
contemporaries such as
Scriabin, Prokofiev, and
Stravinsky. “The new kind of
music seems to create not from
the heart but from the head,”
he said. “Its composers think
rather than feel. They have
not the capacity to make their
works exalt — they meditate,
protest, analyze, reason,
calculate, and brood, but they
do not exalt.” Rachmaninoff’s
music, in contrast, is intensely
emotional, with a unique
musical language arising from
his own incredible gifts as a
pianist. Rachmaninoff’s huge
hands gave him the ability
to clearly articulate complex
chords, a gift reflected in the
dense, orchestral textures of his
keyboard writing.
The Second Sonata in B-flat
minor was written in 1913,
the same year as the great
choral symphony, The Bells.
The original version, massive
in texture and structure, was
played until the early 1930s,
when Rachmaninoff, frustrated
by public reception to his work,
decided to revise a number of
his works, the Sonata among
them. He said: “I look at my
early works and see how much
there is that is superfluous…
Chopin’s sonata lasts nineteen
minutes, and all has been said.”
Rachmaninoff’s philosophy of
simplification appears to have
been to cut passages that were
less effective in performance,
and while this did make the
sonata shorter, the excisions
also compromised the sonata’s
thematic balance.
A third version was created
by Vladimir Horowitz, a great
champion of Rachmaninoff’s
work, and a musician whom
the composer regarded as a
kindred spirit. Horowitz told
Rachmaninoff that he didn’t
agree with all of the changes
in the revision, whereupon
Rachmaninoff told him to
reconstruct it however he
pleased, and bring it back.
Horowitz’s version, which
Rachmaninoff approved,
was a cut-and-paste of the
composer’s two versions,
retaining some of the cuts, but
restoring essential structure.
While this was a very unusual
proceeding, Rachmaninoff
admired and trusted Horowitz’s
taste and competence, and had
always preferred Horowitz’s
performance of the piece to
his own.
The sonata begins with a
stormy Allegro agitato that gives
way to a surprisingly lilting,
delicate meno mosso, which
goes through a masterfully
subtle series of transformations
before erupting into a series of
huge chords leading back to the
opening theme. The opening
theme and the meno mosso
are further developed and
interwoven, and the movement
ends quietly, blending
seamlessly into the rhapsodic
second movement, Non
allegro — Lento, which is full
of poignant sweetness, set in
a graceful triple meter. A brief
interlude leads to the closing
Allegro molto, massive in scale
and texture, remarkable for
consistently building tension
through repeated accelerations
and crescendos, and finally
finding release in the forceful
closing chords.
— Program notes by Joan Rogers
© 2008
The Eleventh Annual
Portland International
Piano Festival
July 12-19, 2009
•
Portland, Oregon
Recitals, master classes, lectures, workshops & films
Greg Anderson • Gail Berenson • Jeremy Denk
Jessica Johnson • Catherine Kautsky • Soheil Nasseri
Paul Roberts • Elizabeth Joy Roe • Andrew Russo
Van Cliburn International Piano Competition Silver Medalist
503.228.1388 • w w w . p o r t l a n d p i a n o . o r g
2008-2009 Season
PAUL ROBERTS Master Class
I n t e r n a t i o n a l
Friday, February 13, 7:30 pm
Sherman Clay/Moe’s Pianos
131 NW 13th Ave
FREE ADMISSION
Not sure if you would enjoy a
master class?
A master class is basically a piano lesson with a
“master” teacher and usually 1-3 students — and
the public is invited to “eavesdrop.” You needn’t
be a teacher or a student to enjoy a master class.
70th Anniversary
ChantiCleer
Friday, February 20
7:30 pm
Kaul Auditorium, Reed College
“Wondrous Free” program
Saturday, February 21
7:30 pm
St. Philip Neri Church
Sacred program
Praised for their “tonal luxuriance and crisply
Come see for yourself!
www.portlandpiano.org
for details
2008-2009 Season
Ebène Quartet
70th Anniversary
March 16 & 17, 7:30 pm
Based in France, the Ebène Quartet is
distinguished by its open-mindedness and
versatility, displaying equal facility in the
classical repertoire, contemporary music,
and jazz.
Monday program – First United Methodist Church
Haydn
Quartet in D Major, Op. 71, No. 2
Fauré
Quartet in E minor, Op. 121
Schubert Quartet in D minor, D. 810,
“Death and the Maiden”
Tuesday program – Kaul Auditorium
All Beethoven Program
Quartet in F Major, Op. 18, No. 1
Quartet in F Major, Op. 59, No. 1
Quartet in C-sharp minor, Op. 131
For Tickets call 503.224.9842 • www.focm.org
etched clarity,” Chanticleer was named Musical
America’s 2008 “Ensemble of the Year.”
For Tickets call 503.224.9842 • www.focm.org