On Friday, May 4th, I attended the morning performance at the New York Philharmonic. The pieces being performed that day were Carnival, Op. 92 by Antonín Dvořák, Piano Concerto No. 2 by Magnus Lindberg, and Symphony No. 4 in F minor Op. 36 by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The piano concerto by Lindberg was actually a world premiere, being performed for the first time the night before. Magnus Lindberg is the Marie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence at the New York Philharmonic, and is finishing up his third and final year. Piano Concert No. 2 is his fourth and final piece he created over his tenure at the Philharmonic.
Although I originally planned on writing this post about Tchaikovsky’s 4th Symphony, this piece in particular grabbed my attention because sounded similar to some of the music we have been studying in class lately. Lindberg, a pianist himself, has a history of creating works with very complex themes and rhythmic patterns. This piece is filled of complex atonal expressions from the piano, and the 38-piece orchestra accompaniment creates looming, almost gloomy textures with big bursts of energy constructing tidal waves of “random” sounding chords.
What was really what caught my eye about this piece was the pianist, virtuoso Yefim Bronfman. His performance was astounding. Lindberg’s piece is extremely complex and it seemed as though Bronfman had no problem with it at all. In a video on the New York Philharmonic’s YouTube account, he discussed Piano Concerto No. 2 and the challenges of a piece like this “One never knows if you’re well prepared for such a complex and fascinating piece. And also one has a sense of relief afterwards that it actually works. Not only that it works but that it is a wonderful piece… It is actually very, very difficult and some of the passages are almost unplayable.”
In a review of the performance in the New York Times, by Anthony Tommasini, gives a brilliant critique of Bronfman’s performance and technique “What made time pass quickly was Mr. Bronfman’s astonishing performance. He mastered every challenge: thick chords that leap across the keyboard; spiraling bursts of runs and sputtering arpeggios; cascades of double thirds; finger-twisting counterpoint; on and on. Only a select roster of pianists will be able to play the concerto. Whatever fee Mr. Bronfman earned for this engagement, it was not enough.”
While discussing his second piano concerto (in the playbill from the performance), Lindberg expressed a need to go to the extreme with his compositions, something I feel he successfully achieved. “The piano concerto is one of those genres that has such a load of history that a composer is challenged to imagine what can be added to it. I don’t think you can truly do much in the direction of inventing entirely new textures for piano playing — although there are wonderful examples from Nancarrow, Cage, and Stockhausen, who came up with unforseen ways of playing the piano — so, for me, the challenge was to stretch expression to the extreme.” His idea of extreme elements were undeniably expressed through this score, and he did a fantastic job while doing so.
Even though I thought this was a fantastic piece and can’t wait to hear it again, my friend that joined me for the performance fell asleep during it. When he woke up he said “Nope. Don’t like it.” Lindberg’s Piano Concerto No. 2 might not be for everyone, but it should be listened to at least once to understand the difficulty and intricacy of the piece (unfortunately since it was only premiered last week, there are no recordings of it online just yet, but check YouTube soon).
Click HERE for a link to Tommasini’s review of the performance in the New York Times.
Click HERE for a video of Yefim Bronfman and his take on Piano Concerto No. 2.
Click HERE for a short commentary from Alan Gilbert, the New York Philharmonic Music Director, about collaborating with Lindberg and Bronfman.