Levin’s passionate improvising makes Mozart an adventure
Ordinary concerts start with the earliest piece, then work up toward more recent times. Tuesday’s concert by the Slee Sinfonietta at the University at Buffalo did it backwards.
It began with a piece for brass by UB composer David Felder, then moved backwards to Morton Feldman. Then it was back to the tonal world, for a rhythmic harpsichord concerto by Polish composer Henryk Gorecki. And only then, when the crowd was really primed, did they crack out the really daring number: Mozart’s 23rd Piano Concerto, K. 488.
What made the Mozart concerto an adventure was the featured pianist, Harvard professor Robert Levin. Levin, an authority on Mozart, has a unique approach: He improvises as he plays. No, really. He wings it. On the phone last week, he confessed that he never is completely sure how a performance is going to turn out.
I have never heard the 23rd concerto like this. Levin doesn’t just play the music. He lives it. It shows in his face, in his whole body. He delights in every note, every chord change. Did I say chord change? He is making me think of jazz.
Because Levin really does use Mozart as a vehicle for improvisation. He goes far beyond anything any other pianists have done in this department. He takes chances. It is like watching a high-wire artist.
And he does it with passion, at top volume, leaning into the beat. This is a big Steinway grand, no demure period instrument. Levin plays when other pianists don’t play — during the orchestral introductions, in the tuttis. You could make the case, if you were some kind of sourpuss, that it was too much. But I don’t want to. I loved it.
I sat through most of it agog. Once I laughed out loud. That was when Levin, his eyebrows raised, his mouth in an O, was dancing his way through a little game Mozart was playing and, as he did so, looked at the orchestra, looked at us, and looked at the conductor, all in time with the riffs. Bravo to Levin. It’s a shame that, over the centuries, classical musicians have dropped the ball on improvisation. Fie on them. It’s time this art was brought back.
The rest of the concert was bracing and interesting. The Felder piece was full of blasts and sharp silences. Jon Nelson, on trumpet, presided with his own peculiar commitment and intensity.
Feldman’s “Rabbi Akiba” was an exercise in space. Long and sprawling, it offered us mournful, drawn-out tones from various instruments, punctuated by soft bells, set off by wordless, drawn-out notes from soprano Lucy Shelton.
I wish I had time and room to say more about Gorecki’s Concerto for Harpsichord and Strings, Op. 40. Jessica Osborne did such an athletic job at the harpsichord.
