Peter Serkin plays Schoenberg, Debussy, Kurtág, Wuorinen and Chopin at Carnegie Hall, by Michael Miller

Peter Serkin
Peter Serkin

 

Peter Serkin, Piano
Carnegie Hall, Zankel Hall, December 10, 2009

Schoenberg – Three Piano Pieces, Op. 11
Debussy – 6 épigraphes antiques
György Kurtág – Selections from Játékok
–Pen Drawing, Valediction to Erzsébet Schaár
–(…and round and round it goes...)
–Portrait
–The mind will have its freedom...
Charles Wuorinen, Scherzo
Chopin, Polonaise in C Minor, Op. 40, No. 2
Chopin, Impromptu in A-flat Major, Op. 29
Chopin, Etude in A-flat Major from Trois nouvelles études
Chopin, Nocturne in E Major, Op. 62, No. 2
Schoenberg, Suite for Piano, Op. 25

Encores:
Bach, Prelude and Fugue in B-flat Major from The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I, BWV 866
Chopin, Etude in G-flat Major, Op. 25, No. 9, "Butterfly"
Chopin, Nocturne in F-sharp Major, Op. 15, No. 2

Peter Serkin is indisputably one of Tanglewood's great draws. His Music Shed performances with the BSO always sure to bring a a close to capacity crowd, and, in decent weather, to populate the lawn quite amply. Nonetheless I'm far more impressed by his ability to attract a little over 500 avid admirers to leave only a few empty seats in Carnegie's Zankel Hall to hear a somewhat esoteric program. In fact it was a brilliant program, and, as much as I admire Peter Serkin in general, this typically Serkinesque program was what made this recital impossible to resist. It began with early atonal Schoenberg and ended with one of his serial pieces. Second on the program was the piano solo version (1914/15) of Debussy's Six épigraphes antiques, which is quite a rarity. When the work is performed it is usually in its primary version for piano four hands. It is Debussy at his most spare and intense, and it is perhaps not hard to understand why it is not among his more popular works. Following on this, came even more concentrated music, four excerpts from the great György Kurtág's Játékok, his own version of a didactic cycle in the spirit of Bartók's Mikrokosmos. The first half closed with Charles Wuorinen's Scherzo, written in 2007 specifically for Peter Serkin. Most of the second half was occupied by an interesting Chopin set, in which Serkin mostly eschewed the war horses, except for the much-beloved E Major Nocturne. Then, as I mentioned the official program ended with Schoenberg's Suite for Piano, Op. 25 (1921-23), the composer's own hommage to the Baroque.

Read the rest on the Berkshire Review for the Arts