Again, Russian pianist Alexander Ardakov delighted an Amersham audience. On this occasion he was playing at Dr Challoner’s Grammar School on 8th October, 2011.
The recital commenced with an energetic and well-paced performance of Beethoven’s sonata no 8 op 13 in C minor ‘Pathetique’. The second movement, so familiar to many of us, was sensitively rendered without being indulgent and the rondo briskly concluded the piece without any fuss. Two Chopin Nocturnes – op 9 no1 in B flat minor and op 9 no 2 in E flat major – and a Scherzo – op 31 no 2 in B flat minor – followed and were well received by the audience.
One of the highlights of the evening was Alexander’s interpretation of music by John Skiba. John is a contemporary English composer (born in 1949) and lives in Northamptonshire. He studied composition with Edmund Rubbra and won first prize for composition at the London Music Festival in 1974 while he was a student at Trinity College of Music. Alexander played Atmosphere no 1, Peace, Song for Iker and Nocturne in G. John was present and clearly as pleased with the performance as was the enthralled audience. Alexander said, ‘I met John Skiba in 2000 at one of my concerts in Aylesbury, he came up and introduced himself. His music is melodic with pure harmonies. In my opinion it is a counterweight to the difficult to understand tendencies of contemporary music in the 20th and 21st centuries.’
Franz Liszt was born in 1811, the year after Chopin, and the second half of the programme consisted entirely of his music to celebrate his 200th anniversary. Alexander combined strength, excitement and delicacy to admirable effect and carried along his listeners from the Petrarch Sonnet no 104, through the Concert Paraphrase ‘Rigoletto’, Liebestraum no 3, Tarantella and Consolation no 3 before concluding with the Mephisto Waltz. The rapturous applause was justly deserved and this most enjoyable evening was all too soon brought to an end with two much appreciated encores.
A week later, Alexander played the same programme at St John’s Smith Square in London but we heard it in Amersham first!
Friends of BCH are most grateful to Alexander for this performance to raise funds for the charity. Alexander moved to the UK from Russia in 1991 and, since then, has pursued a busy professional life giving concerts at notable international venues whilst working as Professor of Piano at Trinity College of Music in London.
The recital raised a handsome £1589.
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