this concert's for kip

[calimac]

Frederic Chiu, the pianist of whom we'd been speaking, brought his all-transcriptions recital program to town on Sunday. Lieutenant Kijé and Beethoven's Fifth on the piano, sounds cool. I snagged a ticket by the simple expedient of asking my editor if I could review it.

And the results are here. Sound bite:

If you wanted subtlety, you should have gone somewhere else. But if you wanted to see a man pound the heck out of a piano, this was the place.

When I read this bit over the phone to my editor, she said, "Oh dear, I'm so sorry." "No, no," I replied. "It was fun." Hey, I listen to the Michael Nyman Band: classical music-making of this kind does not scare me.

Comments

[kip-w.livejournal.com]

Arh, ya lucky dog! I'm glad you enjoyed it. I wish I'd known you were going to see him; I'd have had you ask if the Kije transcriptions are any closer to being printed. When I had the chance to talk briefly with him after his CNU recital, he sounded optimistic, but that was a while back.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

oh crap, I'm so sorry - I remembered you mentioning this, but didn't go back to check, and thought you said you had it. It HAS been printed, there were copies right there for sale, and if I hadn't misremembered I could have bought one for you. I looked through it, and it's the same version that he recorded in his Prokofiev set: no "Birth", and the "Troika" is abridged (as he also played it in the concert). He omitted the "Burial" movement from the concert, but it is in the score.

At his website it says he's reachable at contact@fredericchiu.com, so you might try inquiring there. The introducer says he likes to talk about his music, and he certainly gave a fair share of introductory remarks during the concert, from which I quoted in the review.

[kip-w.livejournal.com]

I got a reply from him today. I just need to send him a check, and he'll send the music. Thanks for the info! As to the parts that aren't in the printed music, I still have them in his handwritten photocopies. His musical notation is very, very neat, but it'll still be easier for me to flounder through it with a printed version.

It'd be interesting to hear someone else play that some day.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

I'm glad that will work out for you.