Simply Spacey'S

I should be focusing on my master's thesis these few days but I could not help but to go for the SSO chamber concert the other night. There was no need to lock myself up in the dorm if it was impossible for me to stay attentive for a whole day. So why not give myself a break and enjoy the sheer beauty of music?

Prokofiev's piano sonata No.6 sounded … brute and mechanical. I had listened to some of his piano sonatas and was not able to enjoy much. This sonata was no exception and it paved the way for my getting drowsy in the next program, Barber's cello sonata, which I had already heard a week ago at the free concert organized by the Philharmonic Society of Fudan University.

Following Barber's sonata, the pre-arranged Polonaise Brillante by Chopin was substituted by the Prelude and Sarabande from Bach's cello suite no.4. It was not a satisfying performance as the cellist rendered it in a tedious manner with a rigid tempo. This reminded me of one of the previous chamber concerts, in which Sam Matthews played the cello suite no.1. What Mr. Matthews' performance amazed me was the contrast he brought about in terms of tone and sonority. His sensitive bowing and fingering made it possible for me to savor the emotional fluctuations (or should I say, nuances) in Bach's composition like the ebb and flow, or to put it in another way, the breath that a line of melody could give. Although the Bach piece fell short of my expectations, the same cellist played out wonderfully on two succeeding pieces, one Viotti (probably, as the cellist spoke damn fast) and one Paganini. Viotti's piece was flat and more like an etude while the Paganini one radiated true brilliance and our cellist did a good job to illustrate his virtuosity in fingering, especially at the higher registers. Alas, the eternally nourishing J. S. Bach and the instantaneously sensational Paganini.

What then? Gosh, Rachmaninov's 3rd piano concerto performed by Zhang Feng with the piano accompaniment by another brilliant pianist whose name I forgot. (Wait, where had the emcee gone?) This was a technically formidable concerto and I was completely carried away at times by Zhang's powerful and resounding playing, e.g. the stupendous arpeggios prior to the coda of the first movement. Over forty minutes of music amply packed with deeply romantic melodies and somehow excessive self-indulgence surely cast an overwhelming influence over my mind, which had been immersed in tons of "ice-cold" lab data and pages of "clichéd" scientific papers. Nonetheless, the two pianists were only moderately applauded. They certainly deserved much more.