{"id":24933,"date":"2015-01-21T19:10:22","date_gmt":"2015-01-22T00:10:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/?p=24933"},"modified":"2015-01-22T11:45:55","modified_gmt":"2015-01-22T16:45:55","slug":"concert-review-gidon-kremer-and-daniil-trifonov-see-eye-to-eye-at-koerner-hall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2015\/01\/21\/concert-review-gidon-kremer-and-daniil-trifonov-see-eye-to-eye-at-koerner-hall\/","title":{"rendered":"CONCERT REVIEW | Gidon Kremer and Daniil Trifonov See Eye-to-Eye at Koerner Hall"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Kremer
Kremer Trifonov recital<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Latvian violinist Gidon Kremer is more than four decades older than the young Russian pianist Daniil Trifonov \u2013 but they saw eye-to-eye in their Thursday evening recital at Koerner Hall. The varied program started well, and only got better when the duo was joined by cellist Giedre Dirvanauskaite.<\/p>\n

Delicacy was raised to foundational principle in Mozart\u2019s Violin Sonata in E Flat K. 481, which opened the recital. And although the Kremer-Trifonov duo\u2019s idea of \u201callegro molto\u201d wasn\u2019t very \u201cmolto,\u201d they established a charming tempo that served their purposes well. Rejecting the role of the \u201cgreat virtuoso soloist,\u201d Kremer matched his playing with Trifonov\u2019s \u2013 and the result was an elegantly poised balance. In the second movement, Kremer sung sweetly on his violin. And the final movement was lively and festive, with some light and even playing from Trifonov.<\/p>\n

Mieczyslaw Weinberg\u2019s Sonata No. 2 for Solo Violin followed the Mozart. Weinberg (in case you don\u2019t know) was a Polish Jew who spent most of his life in the Soviet Union. His music has become a \u201cniche-fashion\u201d in recent years \u2013 and his extensive oeuvre<\/em> includes several unaccompanied sonatas for stringed instruments.<\/p>\n

The sonata Kremer chose to play is in seven short movements \u2013 that run the gamut from clever and capricious and to angry and frenetic, and many other things. Unfortunately, I can\u2019t claim to share Kremer\u2019s love for the piece. Although I\u2019m sure he played it as well as could possibly be played, its thin textures and mid-20th century harmonic language (reminiscent of Shostakovich) made for a very dry musical experience. The most successful movements were the last two: virtuosic outbursts of multiple-stops and jagged rhythms that impressed through sheer energy.<\/p>\n

Schubert\u2019s Fantasie in C Major inhabits a very different (and much more endearing) sound-world than Weinberg\u2019s austerities \u2013 although, like the Weinberg, it\u2019s composed in seven contrasting sections. From the opening, Kremer and Trifonov took an understated approach \u2013 something like their Mozart, but with a veiled, mysterious quality. This Romantic sensibility wove its way through the performance: it was inward looking, yet expressive.<\/p>\n

The second half of the program was entirely given over to Rachmaninoff\u2019s expansive Trio \u00e9l\u00e9giaque No. 2 in D Minor. Joined by Dirvanauskaite \u2013 a young Lithuanian cellist \u2013 the three musicians formed a tightly unified ensemble. Together, they made dark, rich and solemn music, with sequences gradually building up to glorious climaxes. The second movement ebbed and flowed like a river of music. And the third movement was bursting with pianistic intensity \u2013 matched by the violin and cello \u2013 as though Trifonov were channelling Sergei Rachmaninoff himself.<\/p>\n

In a sense, it would be fair to describe Trifonov as prot\u00e9g\u00e9 of Kremer. The esteemed violinist has taken the young Tchaikovsky Competition Gold Medalist under his wing, performing with him in prestigious venues throughout Europe and the USA. And no doubt, Trifonov is learning much from Kremer in their rehearsals. But in performance, they\u2019re very much equals \u2013 not just in ability, but also in shared musical values. Theirs is a refined, sophisticated approach to music making, and there\u2019s nothing gratuitously showy about it.<\/p>\n

Colin Eatock<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Latvian violinist Gidon Kremer is more than four decades older than the young Russian pianist Daniil Trifonov \u2013 but they saw eye-to-eye in their Thursday evening recital at Koerner Hall. The varied program started well, and only got better when the duo was joined by cellist Giedre Dirvanauskaite…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":24934,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[118,76,19,52,63,68],"tags":[953,5249],"yst_prominent_words":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2015\/01\/la-et-cm-gidon-kremer-trifonov-review-20150116.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9bakr-6u9","amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24933"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24933"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24933\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24975,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24933\/revisions\/24975"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24933"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24933"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24933"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=24933"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}