Szymanowski - Metopes (complete)

[fnork]

Performed Szymanowskis "Metopes" today as a part of a competition program to be performed later this week. I was intending to record the whole concert but my battery didnīt allow me to do so, so the recording ends abrubtly in the end of a chopin mazurka...Distorted sound in louder places, sorry about that.

[thorn]

I have listened to The isle of the Sirens and will listen to the other two later on.

I think you give a great performance of it; it is all very clean which is a massive achievement in something so dense. I also got a clear sense of where it was going and of the mood it evokes with clear colour distinctions between melody/what I interpret as bird calls/trill/pedal notes.

My only suggestion would to be to give it more space- it is marked molto rubato e improvisando (or something like that I don't have my copy nearby). The pulse sounded very rigid to me which kind of feels like the sirens are suffocating me rather than seducing and enchanting. Also, I think in the piu mosso section, there is too much excitement early on meaning that you were already at your loudest when it was marked ff and had nothing left to give on the sff/fff bars.

But overall it was beautiful and I enjoyed listening, so thank you and well done. I shall listen to the other two movements later on.

[fnork]

Thank you so much for the comment - the rubato issue seems very spot-on now that I listen back to it. Let me just say it was the first time I played the thing completely by heart (and it was a potisive surprise there were no major ***-ups...) at a lunchtime recital after a completely sleepless night. I guess thereīs a sense of rigidness in the playing partly because of simply having worked a lot on memorization, and some moments feel too much on autopilot which I think mostly has to do with lack of sleep/concentration. now that I can play it through somewhat, itīs time to raise the bar and take it to the next level, making it breathe more. The competition is on friday evening so I have some time still The rest of the program is: Chopin Mazurka op 56 nr 3, Bartok etude op 18 nr 2, Debussy etude "pour les accords". The etudes still need lots of work...

[fnork]

Thanks for the feedback in any case - as you can imagine, clarity is usually the big problem in Szymanowskis dense structures, and Metopes is no exception. (hell, even the mazurkas sometimes create huge problems sometimes on this area) Trills and tremolos I find particularly difficult here. Have you played the piece by any chance, or, other Szymanowski works...? Just one question by the way - where do you think I got too loud in the piu mosso section, or, is it just overall too loud? Again, another spot that easily sounds too dense...And pretty damn awkward to play, anyway.

[thorn]

I have listened to the other two movements.

Calypso: I think this worked really well; it was nicely controlled and balanced. See, personally I feel a more or less rigid tempo works perfectly in this piece; she imprisons him on the island so it makes sense that the music should sound almost claustrophobic (I believe this is how Szymanowski wrote it to sound). It's sometimes difficult to convey impressions over the internet, so I would like to clarify that I am paying you a compliment rather than criticising! What makes this piece for me (in any performance) is a sense of being trapped by the sound, pulled into emptiness/loneliness. I definitely got that from your performance, so thank you ^^

Nausicaa: I don't really know what I can say. Absolutely fantastic. I have never attempted to play it myself, but I'd be happy to play it half as well as you did someday. Really good job!

To answer your question on the Isle of sirens piu mosso, I don't think you got too loud at all, just that it happened so quickly that you were at your loudest in the FF bars and had nothing left to give to the FFF. I think it's as simple as starting a bit quieter so you have more space to build. What I personally do is this: you have a 3/4 and a 2/4 bar before the piu mosso. Although it is not marked in the score, I make a rapid diminuendo and rit from the top of that phrase, which gives me space to really bring the volume down at the start of piu mosso which allows for a huge crescendo over the two pages.

While I remember, have you heard Anderszewski (sp?) playing these? If not, get on youtube now because you MUST!

And I have sort of answered your last question. Of Szymanowski, I have played the Isle of Sirens, Calypso and Sheherazade (Masques). I have also accompanied La fontaine d'arethuse and Narcissus from the Myths.

Finally, you must upload the rest of the program in the future- I love the Bartok and Debussy!

[fnork]

Thanks for the comments, very nice to get some feedback. I do have a different performance of the whole competition programme, some things here and there I wasnīt too happy with but Iīll put it up in a different thread - stay tuned! In any case, the actual competition is on friday and I hope that performance will be the best and the most well-recorded

I do know of Andeszewskis performances of some of these pieces but I was not too impressed. He does have very nice sound overall but the island of the sirens is not only way too slow, but I also find it ridiculous that he takes the "tremolos" (which every other pianist actually does play as a FREE tremolo) in a literal way and plays them as 32-note-triplets or whatever they are notated as. Itīs sufficient to be familiar with the Myths and other Szymanowski pieces to understand how these tremolos should evoke water and such things. Playing them in rhythm and in such a slow tempo destroys the atmosphere, IMO.