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KVT – Muraro and the French

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Muraro… Magnifique… Les Phap… magnifique aussi

What a way to finish up the holidays… a truly wonderful collaboration with Roger Muraro and a Grand Piano at Nha Hat Lon on Wednesday night.

We started with Chopin… as is perfect in his 200th birthday year, and ended the selection with the Andante Spianato and Grande Polonaise Brilliante Op 22. It was composed to be played by someone like Muraro, a musician with enormous artistry, who can play the piano as extrovert, with confidence and with graciousness. It was also perfect and I could have gone home replete in Chopin-iated happiness; but it was not to be…

In 1831 Franz Lizst heard Berlioz’ Symphonie Fantastique, and being a consummate pianist, he transcribed the five movements for solo piano (underwriting the royalties to a financially bereft Berlioz). Lizst’s transcription conforms as literally as possible to Berlioz’ 1832 score.

For more than 40 minutes Muraro held us spellbound with his virtuosity and Lizt/Berlioz We were one with the dramatic musical story of a young man falling in love with a great beauty, being spurned, attempting suicide by overdosing with opium, dreaming he murders the young woman, imagining being marched to the scaffold to be beheaded and ending up at a witches sabbath in hell. Wonderful story, wonderful music and superbly wonderful piano playing…

I wended home supremely happy and even the fact that our noisesome neighbors were back in residence couldn’t dent the euphoria.

Muraro was born in 1959 and is world renowned for his interpretation of the works of Messiaen and as much as I’d have loved to hear a recital of Messiaen pieces, or Ravel (Muraro has recorded all of Ravel’s piano works) I am so glad that we got the Lizst/Berlioz. We were so, so lucky to hear and see a pianist of Muraro’s stature in Hanoi… he plays once more at a booked out concert at L’Espace) and once again the French have allowed us some of the best on offer.

I love the way the French do it all so understatedly. No grand gestures or speeches, just on with the show, and in this case, on with perfectly wonderful music (mind you I love the way they gently ask audiences to refrain from using mobiles and flash photos… and the audiences always respond perfectly. It must be Gallic charm!).

Sometimes we buy a seat at concerts for young students (with L’Espace prices its an easy thing to do) and young Hien from Hai Duong, as over-awed with the Opera House as could be and a lover of rap, fell head over heels into Muraro’s magic and walked away into the velvet night a convert to classical piano.

Not a reviewer, not a critic, “Kiếm Văn Tìm” is an interested, impartial and informed observer and connoisseur of the Hanoi art scene who offers highly opinionated remarks and is part of the long and venerable tradition of anonymous correspondents. Please add your thoughts in the comment field below.

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2 COMMENTS

  1. I totally agree with you, KVT!!!! Muraro is excellent!!!!! I admire the way his hands fly, jump and run over the piano keys!!!!! Muraro expressed not only his perfect technique but also his emotion during the concert.
    I’m a fan of Liszt and I was so lucky to be at the concert to listen to Symphonie Fantastique!!! Muraro’s performance was fantastic!!!
    At the end of the concert my hands turned red (like all the audiences in the hall!) and I saw how tired Muraro was after a 5-chapter symfony, but I didn’t want to leave the Opera House. I wish the concert lasted forever.

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