Volume 23 Issue 2 - October 2017

FEATURE
Q & A
“Somewhat Like a
Painter”
BENJAMIN
GROSVENOR
PAUL ENNIS
PATRICK ALLEN: OPERAOMNIA.CO.UK
Benjamin Grosvenor has an uncanny knack
of getting to the essence of any piece he
plays. Add to that a burnished tone (he is
one of the supreme colourists performing today)
and impeccable, unfettered, seemingly effortless
technique and you have one of the best pianists on
the current concert stage.
Grosvenor is a unique creator of sound, worlds within worlds,
attentive and nuanced; a riveting performer with keen musical
insights. In the public eye for more than half of his life, the
25-year-old returns to the Jane Mallett Theatre November 7 for his
third Music Toronto appearance since March 2014. The following
email exchange took place in mid-September and focuses on that
upcoming recital.
WN: You became the youngest-ever winner of the keyboard section
of the 2004 BBC Young Musician of the Year Competition when you
were 11. How life-changing an event was that?
BG: I think the competition cemented in my mind the idea that
I would like to be a pianist. It was a great experience at the time, in
particular the final which gave me the opportunity to play with a
professional orchestra for the first time. The attention it brought began
my career, although in those early years I did not give many concerts
as naturally I needed the space for schooling and simply to grow as
a musician.
Who was the first composer you fell in love with as a child? Who
were the first performers you fell in love with?
The first composer I really fell in love with was Chopin, and the first
piece I played that I felt a significant connection with was by him - one
of his waltzes. The first performers who had an attraction for me were
those that I saw playing live (Stephen Hough and Evgeny Kissin, for
example) as well as Argerich, Horowitz and Lipatti, who were artists
whose recordings we had in the house. It was only in my early teens
that I began to listen more widely to other pianists and musicians and
discovered many other names both current and historical, becoming
fascinated by artists such as Cortot, Feinberg, Schnabel and others.
You said in a 2013 YouTube webcast that your attraction to
composers like Chopin, Beethoven and Bach initially came from
listening to recordings by pianists from the first half of the 20th
century. Are you still inspired by these giants of the piano? What has
been inspiring you recently?
I still find these pianists to be a source of inspiration - I was recently
listening once again to some of Cortot’s Schumann recordings which
are a marvel. I find these days though that I have less time for listening
than I would like, and particularly not enough time to attend live
concerts. Something I often relish about playing with orchestra is the
opportunity to hear the second half of the program.
Our previous email exchange was prior to your 2015 Toronto
concert with its Baroque rearview-mirror quality. Your program
consisted of most of the pieces you recorded shortly thereafter for
your Homages CD. I’d like to focus on your upcoming Music Toronto
recital, beginning with Mozart’s Sonata No.13 in B-flat Major, K333
“Linz.” What in Mozart speaks to you in general? And what in the
“Linz” sonata in particular?
There is a distilled quality to Mozart’s music - it has such purity and
directness of emotion. But it is not just gilded, elegant music, rather
music that teems with energy, complexity and life, with such a range
of character and emotion. He had an extraordinary gift for juxtaposing
diverse ideas and elements in ways that seem natural and effortless, and
it is music always filled with the surprising and the unexpected.
The piano sonatas are fascinating works to play in that there is
such vivid characterization of the material. His ingenious uses of
textures make the most of the instrument’s limitations, and the
music seems so often to refer to other timbres and instrumental
combinations. With one instrument responsible here for the whole
dialogue, the writing is even more varied than that of the piano
concerti (where the piano only needs to be a piano!) and though
written in a pianistic context, one can imagine wind solos, quartets
and tuttis. The Linz sonata is a great example of this. The outer
movements have a tremendous sense of nervous energy and joie de
vivre, both rich in thematic material and character. The last movement
seems - with its written-in cadenzas and apparent solos/
tuttis - almost like a piano concerto without orchestra. The slow
movement is incredibly tender and lyrical, with wind serenades
and string quartets, and has a particularly unsettling and affecting
middle section.
10 | October 2017 thewholenote.com