The Middlebury Campus

Issue date: 5/8/08 Section: Arts

Media Credit: Tom Ladeau Pianist Paul Lewis finishes his two season sonata cycle with flourish and creative flair. [Click to enlarge]

Pianist Paul Lewis graced Middlebury with a complete cycle of Beethoven's piano sonatas throughout the 2005 and 2006 seasons, but the completion of the cycle certainly has not deterred Lewis from returning to Middlebury with different composers in his fingers. His performance last Friday evening, which offered no Beethoven, proved that Lewis is a persistently sophisticated musician, unconcerned with showpieces but capable of tackling technical hurdles better than any of those insecure pianists who pay more attention to their affected hand motions and body movements than their tedious late Romantic repertoire.

The first half of Lewis' program was framed by longer, single movement Mozart compositions, the C Minor Fantasia K. 475 and the A Minor Rondo K. 511. Lewis' straightforward approach to Mozart seemed to focus on expressive elements, but he seemed careful not to douse them with too much Romanticism. The most shocking part of the concert was not in Lewis' technique or interpretation, but his decision to play Ligeti's "Musica Ricercata" and the following Mozart Rondo "attacca," or without stopping. Usually applause is a kind of cleansing of the palate, but Lewis saw similarities between the works that could not be severed by claps. The shift from atonal to tonal was a bit gruff, but ultimately justified and moving.

Ligeti's "Musica Ricercata" is undoubtedly a modern masterpiece, and a veritable lesson in contemporary harmony. Ligeti's concept merits explanation - the first movement is composed entirely of the pitch A, ending in its dominant, D. Each subsequent movement adds another pitch value. As the work progresses Ligeti substitutes earlier constraints with contrapuntal procedures, and the work culminates in an "atonal" canon. Each movement is shaped on an obsessive motive, be it a complex arpeggio, or, as in the second movement (made famous by Stanley Kubrick's film "Eyes Wide Shut"), a half step. The progression of the work, from tonality to atonality, points towards Ligeti's great achievements of 1960s, his monolithic explorations of microtones and sound masses.

Continued...

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