How does Hamelin do it?

[ahinton]

Indeed he has not, but he is not my friend so I can be totally honest.

As can I; friendship has nothing to do with it, as I am getting rather tired of pointing out.

I can only note his lack of expression in works that require some in the first place.

More properly, you can only note what you take to be his lack of expression - and few works require none, after all...

Best,

Alistair

[austinarg]

for example, a new CD of seven Sorabji piano pieces is soon to be recorded

Are you sure you don't mean "seven CDs of a new Sorabji piano piece"? 

[faulty_damper]

More properly, you can only note what you take to be his lack of expression - and few works require none, after all...

Best,

Alistair

Put up or shut up.  Here's Powell:

Here's Hamelin:

[awesom_o]

Are you sure you don't mean "seven CDs of a new Sorabji piano piece"? 

  LMAO!!

[ahinton]

Are you sure you don't mean "seven CDs of a new Sorabji piano piece"? 

YES!

Best,

Alistair

[ahinton]

Put up or shut up.  Here's Powell:

Here's Hamelin:

You think that I don't already know that? Or that I think that either pianist can do no wrong? Go do your stuff! First it was Powell playing me - then playing Sorabji - now playing Alkan (where I don't have an issue with you in this instance and never would have done but that's hardly the point in more general terms). Make your mind up! (if you have one to make up, that is).

That said, I'm not sure that you could be expected to do that, really, when one considers that you post the above despite having claimed earlier on in this thread that you do not need to listen to comparative performances by different pianists to be able to perceive for yourself the value of a work...

Best,

Alistair

[kakeithewolf]

Does a person ask a fish how it swims, or a bird how it flies? No, they don't. They know by nature that they were engineered and crafted to do what they do, how they do it. And Hamelin is no different, in a sense. Why is he talented? Because he was made to be.

[ronde_des_sylphes]

Perhaps he is - and if that Norma Fantasy recording that you mention is the old one on the Music & Arts label, I'd be inclined to agree with you; the recording itself is very hard-nosed, the instrument seems unyielding and the playing sounds to me like that of a "young pianist" whose development in terms of immaculacy of mécanique has way exceeded the rest of it - but this was all a long time ago and I've since heard him play that very work with far greater subtlety and thought than he did on that disc.

Actually, for reference, the recording I had in mind was this one.

from 1.13
Now I accept that it is a invidious selection, as the sound quality in the clip clearly isn't good, but there is a lack of voicing, a lack of sense even of it being operatic in nature, and the clip also gives the lie to the myth (in some quarters) of his complete technical invincibility. I found myself longing for Bolet's late recording, where it admittedly becomes painfully obvious he is ill, but still he brings far greater subtlety, control, and emotion to the music. I could have found other clips to cite - it was just that that particular one had stuck in my memory.

[ahinton]

Actually, for reference, the recording I had in mind was this one.

from 1.13
Now I accept that it is a invidious selection, as the sound quality in the clip clearly isn't good, but there is a lack of voicing, a lack of sense even of it being operatic in nature, and the clip also gives the lie to the myth (in some quarters) of his complete technical invincibility. I found myself longing for Bolet's late recording, where it admittedly becomes painfully obvious he is ill, but still he brings far greater subtlety, control, and emotion to the music. I could have found other clips to cite - it was just that that particular one had stuck in my memory.

Thanks for this confirmation.

Hamelin has long deplored people's commments about his "complete technical invincibility" and the like, remarking on one occasion that it's like being set up without your consent so that you have farther to fall when you do. He has also said that people who make these claims have never heard him practise. He wisely has no belief in such invincibility either on his own part or on that of any other pianist.

Actually, the awful recording notwithstanding, this sounds to be a rather better account than the earlier commercial recording that he made, although I have little doubt that he plays it far better again now - a view apparently shared by the person who commented on this video as follows:

"I had the pleasure of hearing him play this tonight, and I am happy to say he's changed his style greatly. Instead of rushing and losing control like in this video, he took his time and it sounded great. He still of course missed a few notes (who wouldn't) but he took the time to bring musicality to the whole piece. I was totally blown away."

Whether or not he or anyone else likes it, Hamelin's work looks set to continue to invite divisiveness of viewpoint rather more than some pianists, though in truth it's hardly him that's doing the inviting. I have no personal interest, however, in setting Hamelin up against either Powell or, for that matter, Bolet (one of whose last recitals I attended and would not have missed it for the world, despite his heroic struggles against evident frailty). In the finale of Alkan's Symphonie, Powell is not match either for Hamelin or indeed Maltempo, although quite why he chooses to adopt this leisurely pace for it is something beyond my understanding; likewise, Hamelin is no match for Powell in Sorabji. But here we go again - in even writing such statements, I might be seen as guilty of falling into the seemingly ubiquitous trap of setting up one pianist against another, which says far less about the person doing it than it does about the artistry of either - si I shall cease and desist forthwith!...

Every pianist will have his/her strengths/weaknesses; the particular strengths of Michelangeli and Argerich, for example, probably attract little dissent and among their weaknesses were/are probably an unusually great fear of performing solo in public and a frustrating reluctance to present more than a tiny fraction of their respective repertoires to audiences (I don't know much about Argerich's "secret repertoire", but I understand that Michelangeli played all of Schönberg's piano works and Webern's Variations and had even done some work at one time on the Deuxième Sonate of Boulez, all well away from public gaze and earshot).

It's a relief that this discussion has returned to civility.

Best,

Alistair