Leslie Howard in Recital

Image via Facebook

Before reviewing this recital, a brief hymn of praise: what a wonderful thing a piano recital is. It sadly has become almost a rarity. This recital was a splendid occasion: a fine artist, a beautiful Hamburg-built Steinway D, an expertly selected program, not a word from the stage, standard lighting and a booklet of intelligent program notes. A perfect night for this reviewer.

2015 marks the 50th anniversary of the Sir Zelman Cowan School of Music and to celebrate this significant milestone, the School and its Monash Academy of Performing Arts is presenting an impressive series of some 30 concerts. They offer a salutation to 50 years of achievement and innovation in presenting the public with concerts by internationally distinguished alumni, including pianist Leslie Howard. 

Dr Howard is a musician’s musician: a composer, first-rate international concert pianist and musicologist. His favoured repertoire (particularly Liszt and Rachmaninov) demands a formidable technique and an orchestral breadth of tone colour. Howard’s performance on this occasion was marked by a disciplined and measured approach to the Olympian virtuosic challenges before him, achieving a clarity of expression and form which can only come from an astute and finely developed musical intelligence. Howard’s tone colours were astonishingly effective ranging from gossamer-thin filigree lightness through to a grand Romantic breadth, lyricism and weight. He had total command of the instrument and a complete understanding of the repertoire he selected and performed.

The recital commenced with Finnish Sibelius’s only Piano Sonata. Considered an ‘early work’ the Sonata is brimming with fresh ideas, colours, textures and rich with possibilities; it has been described as more orchestral than pianistic. The fact that the composer was a violinist may go towards explaining the awkwardness of some of the writing. The wonderfully dark second movement is a treasure-trove, a premonition of the composer’s greatness in maturity and was superbly realised by Howard.  

The fiendishly difficult Second Sonata by Russian composer, Glazunov followed. Howard’s careful and well-judged approach made perfect sense of the contrapuntal opening Moderato while the devilishly hard Scherzo once described by the soloist as ‘a treacherous study in double notes in no way relieved by the faster toccata of the trio section’ was masterfully accomplished with élan.

After interval, the second half of the recital comprised music by the composer Howard has dedicated much of his career to: Franz Liszt; Howard has committed decades to recording the piano music of Liszt on 99 CDs. The delicate, late compositions Quatre Valses oubliées and rarity Petite Valse (Nachspiel zu den 3 vergessenen Walzer) with ending completed by Howard from the fragmentary original score were like exquisite abstract paintings before the virtuosic high point of the evening, the Réminiscences des Huguenots de Meyerbeer – Grande Fantaisie dramatique, a mighty canvas of technical and dramatic brilliance. Many mature artists judiciously choose to program works which provide an opportunity to rest on laurels but not Leslie Howard.  For here was a spectacular and large-scale study of Meyerbeer’s grand opera Les Huguenots approaching the extreme limits of virtuosity. 

In sum: a superb recital. Let’s hope for another return visit not too far away.

Rating: 4 stars out of 5