{"id":44386,"date":"2017-04-04T15:55:44","date_gmt":"2017-04-04T19:55:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/?p=44386"},"modified":"2017-04-04T15:55:44","modified_gmt":"2017-04-04T19:55:44","slug":"the-scoop-martha-argerich-storms-small-town-nova-scotia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2017\/04\/04\/the-scoop-martha-argerich-storms-small-town-nova-scotia\/","title":{"rendered":"THE SCOOP | Martha Argerich Storms Small Town Nova Scotia"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Martha
Martha Argerich<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Lunenburg Nova Scotia. March 31 to April 2<\/h3>\n

Since it opened in 2009, Koerner Hall has attracted many world-class musicians to its stage, in part because of the beauty of its design and superb acoustics and in part, according to Mervon Mehta, because Toronto audiences have a good reputation. \u201cThey really listen in Toronto,\u201d Andras Schiff was quoted as saying to Mehta.\u00a0 Torontonians have reason to be proud of the venue they have created and support, and of the conduct that elite musicians welcome.<\/p>\n

But so far, this has not been enough to attract the performer who is described as \u201cthe greatest living pianist\u201d, Martha Argerich.\u00a0 Instead, she recently chose to make an appearance at the Lunenburg Academy of Music Performance last week, where she attended two masterclasses for six exceptional young pianists, gave a public rehearsal, and a gala concert.<\/p>\n

What drew her there, according to one of those six exceptional pianists, U of T Faculty of Music DMA candidate David Potvin, was not the beauty of the venue or the caliber of the audience, but friendship.<\/p>\n

\"Pianists
Pianists descend on small town Nova Scotia for a once in a lifetime chance to play for Martha Argerich. (Photo: Lunenburg Academy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cWalter Delahunt, the director of the piano program at LAMP, was staying at the same hotel as Argerich many years ago.\u00a0 Being a night owl, Delahunt had stocked up on breakfast food so he didn\u2019t have to rush to the continental breakfast offered early in the morning at the hotel.\u00a0 When he discovered that Argerich also retired late and missed breakfast, he offered to share his provisions with her.\u00a0 They\u2019ve been friends ever since,\u201d Potvin recounted to me on return to Toronto.\u00a0 \u201cThat spirit of friendship spread to the entire group, and we had a week of hard work balanced by great camaraderie.\u201d<\/p>\n

Potvin and another Toronto pianist, Geoffrey Conquer, a student at the Glenn Gould School, attended a master class with Walter Delahunt every afternoon, and rehearsed every morning.\u00a0 Argerich arrived part way through the week, and sat in on the master classes, but did not formally teach.\u00a0 Conferring with Delahunt, she made sparing comments, which were appreciative and supportive according to Potvin, to whom she said \u201cBravo\u201d after his performance of Images Book 1 by Debussy.\u00a0 She paid Geoffrey Conquer the compliment of asking him what his fingering was for a passage from Estampes.\u00a0 Aside from being flattering, she displayed one of the traits of the true master musician \u2014 an unflagging interest in the details of execution.\u00a0 Another one of those traits \u2014 extreme industriousness \u2014 was evident at the rehearsal of Argerich and Delahunt, which was scheduled for one hour and lasted for four, as the two pianists worked through the four hand selections of Mozart, Brahms, Shostakovich and Ravel.<\/p>\n

Potvin, who will be giving a noon recital at St Andrew\u2019s Church on April 21, hails from Nova Scotia, as does Walter Delahunt, who was born in Wolfville.\u00a0 Three Haligonian high school students also played for Argerich.\u00a0 The other pianists came from Vienna, New York, Amsterdam and Newfoundland by way of Azerbaijan.<\/p>\n

For more CLASSICAL MUSIC NEWS, visit\u00a0HERE<\/u><\/a><\/span>.<\/h3>\n

#LUDWIGVAN<\/i><\/b><\/h3>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pianists descend on Lunenburg Nova Scotia for a once in a lifetime chance to play for the “Queen of Classical Music,” Martha Argerich.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":44397,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[6439,39,47],"tags":[9529,9530,5213],"yst_prominent_words":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2017\/04\/Martha-Argerich-2-1.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9bakr-bxU","amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44386"}],"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\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44386"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44386\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44399,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44386\/revisions\/44399"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44386"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=44386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}