The wildest violin recital of our times
mainFrom the Lebrecht Album of the Week:
…. Only Patricia Kopatchinskaya would have made these connections, and no other violinist could bring them to life with such wildfire exuberance, verging on madcap abandon. The Russian pianist Polina Leschenko, rather than offering a steadying hand with big, bold chords, is a subtle provocateur, forever daring barefoot Pat Kop to do something really wicked….
Read on here.
Watch sample here:
I’m sorry, but I found her album to be unforgivable. Outside of the freak show presentation style she’s known for, I have no idea what attracts people to her. It certainly can’t be her playing. Just because you has some “wicked” idea, doesn’t mean you should act upon it. Case in point from this fellow: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzBGDYvJzlA
The clownish emoting is boring and tiresome. I still find the aural experience of music far more interesting. Perhaps she can claim that audience members get the value of two tickets for the price of one: dance recital AND music recital.
I greatly admire her musicianship and her adventuresome spirit. I love her Bartok, Ligeti, and Eotvos disc, and her Stravinsky and Prokofiev one is equally great. She seems to live the music she plays, and some people are uncomfortable with that.
The music I heard from her she didn‘t live it, she killed it. She narcisstically posessed it, abused it and strangled it.
When one closes the eyes, trying to ignore her visual ticks, there is not much music left. She seems to have the idea to impress visually. More like an expressive dancer with a violin.
She is very capable on the violin, no doubt. But I‘m not sure she enjoys listening to herself.
I do not see her when I listen to a c.d. and yet find a lot of music in the recordings I mentioned. Yes, she can be distracting when one sees her play, but one should not judge her music making on those grounds.
You know KopPat also sings ? She recently did soprano part of Pierre Lunaire
You probably mean Pierrot Lunaire, but, even though its vocal part is usually performed by a soprano, the voice type is not specified by the composer because there is no real “singing” in its traditional sense there – “Sprechstimme” only.
“Sprechgesang” – more precisely – as in Gurrelieder. While Schönberg asked for rhythmical precision and correct intonation it should never remind of singing.
If Wikipedia (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierrot_Lunaire and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprechgesang), which repeatedly states that Sprechstimme is a more appropriate term for Pierrot Lunaire’s vocal part, is not a sufficiently authoritative source for you, then take a look at Britannica which also agrees that Sprechstimme is a correct term for that piece and says the following verbatim:
“Sprechstimme, (German: “speech-voice”), in music, a cross between speaking and singing in which the tone quality of speech is heightened and lowered in pitch along melodic contours indicated in the musical notation. Sprechstimme is frequently used in 20th-century music. Its introduction is especially associated with the composer Arnold Schoenberg, who first used it in his Pierrot Lunaire (1912)”.
==You know KopPat also sings ?
You mean PatKop 😉