Sheudarebelia !!!!!

Just back from Elisso's concert at Salle Pleyel. On the programme this morning, Camille Saint-Saëns' Concerto for piano n° 2 wth the Colonne Orchestra, conducted by Laurent Petitgirard.

Elisso (HERE Schubert's Impromptu) has been so busy with tours in Austria, Latvia, Switzerland etc that I haven't seen her for ages. It was wonderful to see her sitting at the Steinway on the familiar stage of Pleyel in Paris VIIIè. (See HERE for Chopin's study nr.12). She has an incredible style about her always, an elegance of self, of presence, of touch and of sound... Her Saint-Saens was simply marvellous, despite the rather noisy public.

Elisso's concert was a Sunday matinée, and thus the concert hall was filled with children. We heard the concerto and then left missing the second half (Schumann and without Elisso) as I am notably devoid of tolerance level for children who can't sit still, yell and kick the back of my seat in the middle of a pianissimo. I would dearly like to know why parents do not teach their children to sit quietly, to listen, to understand what they have been brought to hear... if they cannot find a babysitter and still want to attend a concert, I understand the difficulties, but for heavens sake, teach the child something of what they are about to experience so they don't get bored and fidgetty. It was almost impossible to concentrate on Elisso's superb concerto due to the noise in the concert hall - rustling sweet papers, talking, crying, fighting between siblings, parents hissing, annoyed non-parents hissing equally with 'sshhhhh!!' that made more noise still... Simply out of respect for the pianist, I would have hoped for a little more decorum... but perhaps I am simply a fussy, intolerant, childless woman who doesn't understand how hard it is to be a parent in this day and age...

The Saint Saens concerto was written for organ and is fun, with a great deal of swing. It is rhythmic, synchopated, light and filled with gymnastics. Elisso, bent over her Steinway keyboard, nose almost to the keys, was faultless (and I hope oblivious to the noise in the audience). What a joy to hear her once more!

Here's some info on her from Wikipedia:

Elisso Bolkvadze^[1] (née à Tbilissi en 1967) est une pianiste classique géorgienne.

A l'âge de quatre ans elle entre à l'école de prodiges de Tbilissi. À sept ans, elle donne son premier concert avec orchestre. Elle continue ensuite à étudier au conservatoire avec différents professeurs et suit parallèlement des master-classes avec Tatiana Nikolaeva, Lev Naoumov et Serge Milshtein.

En 1995, sa rencontre avec Michel Sogny est, à ses yeux, déterminante pour approfondir et affiner son jeu.

Elle enregistre pour le label Sony des concertos pour piano et orchestre de Tchaïkovski, Rachmaninov, Saint-Saëns et Liszt sous la direction de Djansug Kakhidze.

Elisso Bolkvadze a également enregistré chez Cascavelle (Réf. Cascavelle : VEL 3129 / Distribution Abeille Musique) le Récital Festival Michel Sogny donné au Château de Coppet en août 2007. Au programme : Beethoven, Mozart, Ravel & Michel Sogny.

Elisso Bolkvadze se produit à travers l'Europe et les États-Unis dans des salles prestigieuses : Herkulesaal (Munich), Teatro Manzoni (Milan), Kennedy Center (Washington), Pasadena Auditorium (Californie), Schubert Saal (Vienne), Orchestra Halle (Chicago), Orange Cownty (Costa Messa), Broward Center (Miami Beach), Philharmonic Hall (Saint-Pétersbourg), Congress Hall (Innsbruck), la Salle Gaveau et le Théâtre des Champs-Élysées (Paris).

Elle a joué sous la direction de Petr Altrichter, Lior Shambadal, William Kirchke, Michel Tabachnik, Kiri Taki, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, Djansug Kakhidze, Laurent Petitgirard, Saulius Sondeckis en compagnie des orchestres de Saint-Pétersbourg, Prague Symphony Orchestra, l'Orchestre du Gewandhaus de Leipzig, l'orchestre de la Fondation Gulbenkian, l'Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, le Santa Fe Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, le Dallas Symphony Orchestra, le Georgia National Symphony Orchestra, The Dublin Symphony Orchestra, et le Innsbruck Symphony Orchestra.

See HERE with the Tblissi Orchestra conducted once again by Laurent Petitgirard, Mozart's Sonata in B and Prokofiev's Sonata nr. 7 III Finale

The Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op. 22 by Camille Saint-Saëns, was composed in 1868 and is probably Saint-Saëns' most popular piano concerto. It was dedicated to Madame A. de Villers née de Haber. At the première, the composer was the soloist and Anton Rubinstein conducted the orchestra. Saint-Saëns wrote the concerto in three weeks, and had very little time to prepare for the première; consequently, the piece wasn't ant initial success. The capricious changes in style provoked Zygmunt Stojowski to quip that it "begins with Bach and ends with Offenbach." Ha!! It's quite true! It does! Hear a little of it here played by my beloved Rubinstein back in 1975 when the master was a sprightly 88!

Elisso's Saint Saens concerto isn't yet on the web to share with you, BUT you can go and buy the album instead!! Yeees!! Elisso has a marvellous new CD out: Saint Saens, Rachmaninov and Liszt, see HERE!

Comments

[Little Me]

Totally agree - also have low tolerance levels for misbehaving children, to the point that I no longer go to the cinema on the weekend, only during the week in school time. Yes, I will take a day of holiday to go to the cinema to avoid small people spoiling the film for me.

However there is the argument that classical music holding matinée performances which will obviously be more accesible to children is breaking down barriers and helping to encourage a new generation of music lovers. Although the majority of them may be bored (and, at that age, I don't blame them) one of them may be a potential genius with a violin, or whatever, and maybe it would be worth it just for that.