Fort Worth 2013 Tchai 1 reviews

Two reviews appeared - recorded here for posterity

Review 1

The original article below appeared in Fort-Worth Star Telegram,  here: http://www.dfw.com/2013/02/01/748388/pianist-offers-bold-and-successful.html

Pianist offers bold and successful interpretation of Tchaikovsky's First at Bass Hall

<Photo by STAR-TELEGRAM/RODGER MALLISON - Nobuyuki Tsujii, 2009 Cliburn gold medalist, takes a bow after performing.>

Fort Worth Symphony

Orchestra

Soloist Nobuyuki Tsujii

8 tonight, 2 p.m. Sunday

Bass Hall

817-665-6000

www.fwsymphony.org

By Olin Chism

Special to DFW.com

Posted 11:43pm on Friday, Feb. 01, 2013

image shown via Internet link

FORT WORTH -- To complain about yet another Tchaikovsky First Piano Concerto in Fort Worth is as pointless as complaining that flowers bloom in spring. It's what flowers do, and it's what Tchaikovsky's First does, especially in years, such as this, when the Cliburn Competition is on tap.

The latest appearance, with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra playing in Bass Hall on Friday night, was less subject to complaint than usual because the soloist was Nobuyuki Tsujii, and he gave a performance that was by no means routine.

It was a bold interpretation filled with subtleties of tempo, dynamics and phrasing. As co-winner of the last Cliburn Competition, Tsujii is well known to Fort Worth audiences.

It seemed to me that Friday's performance was slightly more forceful and risk-taking than some of his competition turns.

It certainly was dramatic, and judging by the rapt silence throughout, the large audience was caught up in what he was doing.

Miguel Harth-Bedoya and the orchestra certainly seemed attuned to his interpretation, producing bold and captivating sounds of their own.

Tsujii got a thunderous reception at the end and responded with not one but two encores. The first I didn't recognize, but the second was by Stephen Foster. (Tchaikovsky and Foster in juxtaposition? Makes sense.)

As usual, the program began with the Star-Spangled Banner. The audience sang more lustily than usual, and Harth-Bedoya turned to compliment them on their singing (maybe a first in Bass Hall).

The first classical piece on the program, which Harth-Bedoya called "maybe the most classical program of the season," was Brahms' Variations on a Theme by Haydn. The string sound was kind of harsh, but it was a genial performance of a genial composition and a pleasant warm-up for the Tchaikovsky.

The program was unusually long, with three pieces of substantial length plus two encores, so I was unable to take in all of Schubert's Symphony No. 9 before deadline approached. It seemed to be going well, though, with some noble trombone sounds and impressive woodwinds as highlights.

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Review 2

The article below originally appeared in Dallas News  here: http://www.dallasnews.com/incoming/20130202-fwso_0103gd.ece/BINARY/w620x413/fwso_0103gd

Classical music review: Nobuyuki Tsujii returns to the Fort Worth Symphony

 Pianist Nobuyuki Tsujii performed with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra Friday night at Bass Hall.

Scott Cantrell

Classical Music Critic

scantrell@dallasnews.com

Published: 02 February 2013 01:07 AM

FORT WORTH — The blind Japanese pianist Nobuyuki Tsujii caused a sensation at the 2009 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. His technical command was impressive, but even more impressive was the revelation that he learned music not by Braille (there is such notation), but by ear: from recordings and hearing his teacher play individual chords and lines. Both Tsujii and the Chinese pianist Haochen Zhang were awarded gold medals.

Tsujii was back in Bass Performance Hall Friday night, performing the Tchaikovsky First Piano Concerto with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra. Again, the rock-solid technique and confidence impressed. But there was little of the expressive nuance that distinguishes a great performance from an accomplished one.

Too little happened between loud and soft. What should have been singing lines too often sounded like mere series of notes. Repetitive patterns always sounded the same.

At 24, Tsujii is still a young musician. He would benefit from working with a teacher known for cultivating expressivity — Leon Fleisher, for example. Still, his is an enormous accomplishment, and his performance drew a roaring ovation. With close attention from music director Miguel Harth-Bedoya, the orchestra accompanied skillfully.

Often a rather mechanical conductor, Harth-Bedoya led a genuinely gracious — and, where appropriate, jolly — account of the Brahms Haydn Variations. Phrases were thoughtfully shaped, with natural breaths between them.

Like most conductors, and as printed editions indicate, Harth-Bedoya took the opening of the Schubert “Great” C major Symphony at a leisurely four beats per measure, with an unmarked accelerando into the main Allegro, ma non troppo. But Schubert’s own manuscript marks this in cut time, suggesting one measure here equals two in the Allegro — in other words, the same basic pulse throughout.

Otherwise, tempos were impeccably judged to give forward motion, without either dragging or hurrying. But Harth-Bedoya pretty much went back on metronome patrol, with little acknowledgment of Schubert’s almost invariably vocal phrases. The orchestra played very well.

With particularly inane comments beforehand and two Tsujii encores — one of Tchaikovsky’s Seasons, I believe, and presumably the pianist’s own arrangement of “Jeanie With the Light Brown Hair” — the concert lasted nearly two and a half hours.

PLAN YOUR LIFE: Repeats at 8 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday at Bass Performance Hall, Fourth and Commerce, Fort Worth. $11 to $79. 817-665-6000, fwsymphony.org.

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Review 3

This review appeared in Theater Jones

A Welcome Return

Blind pianist Nobuyuki Tsujii is back in Texas to play the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1 with the Fort Worth Symphony

by Gregory Sullivan Isaacs

published Saturday, February 2, 2013

Nobu Plays Tchaikovsky presented by Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra

presented by

Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra

Bass Performance Hall

330 E. Fourth St.

Fort Worth, 76102

Fort Worth — The 2009 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition had a big surprise hidden in the roster of competitors. This was the Japanese pianist Nobuyuki Tsujii, whose complete command of technique and fiery interpretations had everyone agog. But the most amazing part is that the young virtuoso is blind and that he learns all of his complex virtuoso repertoire one note at a time, with the help of his teacher and a collection of recordings. Memorizing major piano concerti is hard enough when you can see the music in the process, but Tsujii's accomplishment is nothing short of astounding. He shared the gold medal with the Chinese pianist Haochen Zhang.

For those who didn't have a chance to experience this brilliant pianist at the time, he is back in Bass Performance Hall for concerts this weekend. The now 24-year-old pianist is appearing with the Fort Worth Symphony, playing Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1 in B flat minor, Op. 23. This work has become a signature piece for Fort Worth because favorite son Van Cliburn won the Tchaikovsky competition with it in 1958. You have to admire Tsujii's decision to play this particular concerto at this time, what with the next Cliburn competition already in its preliminary stages and Cliburn himself in failing health.

Tsujii's performance still has all of the fire we remember from 2009. In fact, on Friday evening, there were passages where his steely fingers overplayed the piano, distorting the sound. There were other times that the melodic line seemed to wander rather than head to a satisfying musical destination. Occasionally, he overused the sustaining pedal. However, this is not a Chopin concerto where such quibbles would mar the piece. This is Tchaikovsky at his bang-bang best and Tsujii delivered an exciting performance that brought the audience spontaneously to its feet. Music Director Miguel Harth-Bedoya was a sensitive and supportive musical partner and the FWSO played beautifully.

Tsujii played two unannounced encores. A request to the FWSO management to identify them was unanswered by the deadline so they will be added later. To take a wild guess, one was an overblown arrangement by someone of Stephen Foster's artfully simple song "Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair." There was buzz at intermission that the other was a piece from Tchaikovsky's The Seasons, which is a cycle of 12 character pieces for piano, one for each month of the year, but no one was certain about that. 

Harth-Bedoya had a great night all the way around. In both of Brahms' Haydn Variations that opened the program, and Schubert's "Great" C major Symphony that ended it, he was completely in control of both himself and the music. The Brahms moved inexorably forward at a stately tempo and built to the end right from the beginning.  Harth-Bedoya never allowed the orchestra to overplay, but the gravitas that is the hallmark of a fine Brahms performance was present throughout. He also took a moment to breath, a luftpause, between the variations to clear the musical palette before starting the next section. (That said, the program is a long 2½ hours, and deleting the Brahms would have brought it back to the more typical two hour running time.)

The Schubert was also beautifully paced and played with the overall architecture in mind from the start to finish. There is a great controversy about the time signature of the opening of the symphony, which affects the tempo. Harth-Bedoya took the more common approach of playing it in a stately 4/4 and then taking an accelerando into the main section of the movement. That aside, Harth-Bedoya's tempi were spot on throughout. The FWSO was also in top form on Friday and all of the solo passages were beautifully played and shaped. Intonation was excellent.

Performances of this long symphony (it takes about an hour) can be deadly and you always approach a concert where it is going to be played with some trepidation and a preparatory cup of coffee. Schubert never heard the work and you can't help but speculate that, if he had heard a performance, he would have made some revisions and a few cuts. There have been performances of Schubert's "Great" with major conductors in which snoring in the audience rose to the level of the Snoring Chorus in Berg's Wozzeck.

Not so here. Harth-Bedoya kept the performance alive and engaging throughout, even when Schubert doesn't help with his repetitious style, especially in the last movement. In fact, this was one of the most enjoyable performances of the work in memory. Thanks For Reading

Comments:

Cheryl Thomson writes:

Saturday, February 2 at 1:09AM

We came prepared to be tired at the end with Shubert knowing how it can be. We were delighted as usual with Miguel Harth-Bedoya. He involves to the very end and with Nobuyuki Tsujiii we felt as if we had been at two concerts with both so different and satisfying!

M. L. Liu writes:

Monday, February 4 at 11:11AM

Thank you for this review.  May I please respond.

1. Regarding this statement "You have to admire Tsujii's decision to play this particular concerto at this time" --  I am not a learned critic, but it is my understanding that the choice of what to play is the orchestra's, not the soloist's.  Nobu has performed this concerto countless times since debuting in Corpus Christ with Maestro John Giordano in 2010 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DX3q-Mumx9U

2. Nobu's own website (http://www.nobupiano1988.com/recitalreport/index.html ) mentions the various encores played over the three performances.

1) The encores played on the first night were: Trioka (November)from Tchaikovsky's "Seasons" cycle; "Tribute to Jenny" (Nobu's impression of Stephen Foster's "Jeanie of light brown hair" and Nobu's tribute to American music).

2) The encore played on the second night was Rachmaninov's Prelude in G sharp minor Op. 32, No. 12.

3) The encore played on Sunday was Liszt's "La Campanella".