Impressive Beethoven Interpretation

The Australian pianist GS convinces in his concert…..

DARMSTADT….”………….here you have a sonata which will give pianists something to work at….” Beethoven wrote in 1819, as he sent the piano sonata no.29 to his publisher.  And indeed the ‘Hammerklavier sonata is Beethoven’s most difficult work for piano. Interpreter of the first public performance, decades after Beethoven’s death, was Franz Liszt. Now Gil Sullivan impressed, in the Darmstadter Orangerie, with an interpretation that brought out the personal element of this sonata.

With breathtakingly light playing and complete technical security, the pianist took the first movement with all the power and impact which, among others, through the contrast-rich main theme and the energetic, almost unending harmonic and contrapuntal curving surges, is built into the composition, and brought out the fine nuances of this over-dimensional work.

The third movement with its simply embossed melody, he played with deeply felt and touching dedication, while in the Finale, his stunning accuracy was dazzlingly brilliant with the stormy fugue.

Also in Mozart’s KV332 sonata, Sullivan pleased with light-hearted playing which allowed Mozart’s roguish and mischievous character to burst out. Due to intelligently placed tempo rubatos, one after another, thematic ideas seemed to appear and grow.

As contrast, the only Australian fully professional concert pianist delivered three landscape portraits of his homeland: the pieces of Miriam Hyde (1913-2005) allowed pictures of strange, wild landscapes to flow past us, and the public was enthused and delighted by this Australian impressionism.