Biography

The career of British pianist Christian Blackshaw is a most unusual one. Following studies at Royal Northern College of Music, the Royal Academy of Music, the St. Petersburg Conservatory, and private work with his pianistic hero, the legendary Clifford Curzon, Blackshaw embarked on the concert circuit only to stop abruptly in 1990, partly due to the death of his wife from cancer, but also because of a reluctance to continue performing at any level short of the Platonic ideal he had set himself. (“A perfectionist with a reverence for the composer that verges on the crippling,” is how one critic described him.) Blackshaw made a remarkable comeback a few years ago, performing Mozart’s sonatas in London’s Wigmore Hall to tremendous critical acclaim. A supreme control of dynamics, great emotional depth, and a “singing soul” marked these performances. His recordings of this repertory have been described as “captivating,” “magical,” and “masterful.” The Guardian remarked that on the basis of the first two volumes, “if Blackshaw retired tomorrow he’d never be forgotten.” Volume 4 was named one of the Best Classical Recordings of 2015 in the New York Times, and Gramophone magazine named it one of the Top 50 Greatest Mozart Recordings. During the 2018-2019 season Blackshaw served as Artist in Residence at Wigmore Hall in London. He was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire for services to Music in 2019. 3rd LMMC appearance.

https://www.christianblackshaw.com/

Notes

Haydn’s Andante con variazioni is generally regarded as one of the composer’s finest short piano compositions. The title is somewhat misleading in that “Andante” indicates not an introductory passage but rather the tempo marking for the entire work. This composition represents an excellent example of the double-variation form. Two themes, the first in F minor, the second in F major, are presented at the outset, and are followed by variations alternately based on each theme.

It is somewhat ironic that Tchaikovsky wrote the world’s most popular piano concerto, yet this same composer’s one hundred or so little pieces for piano alone are virtually unknown today. Perhaps the least unknown of these are some of the pieces in the collection known in the west, mistakenly, as The Seasons, though a mere glance at the titles will reveal that in fact they should be, as Tchaikovsky originally called them in Russian, The Months. Late in 1875, the editor of a St. Petersburg music journal called Nuvellist conceived the idea of asking a famous composer to write a series of short piano pieces intended for amateurs, to be included in each monthly issue of the journal over the course of 1876. The first publication in an English-language edition improperly called the work The Seasons, and the title stuck. 

Schumann’s Fantasy represents one of the towering landmarks of the nineteenth-century piano repertory. It is quintessentially music of the romantic period  ̶  sprawling in form, passionate in character, utterly personal and unorthodox in conception. Schumann wrote to his future wife Clara in 1838 that “I think the first movement is more impassioned than anything I have ever written  ̶  a deep lament for you.” Indeed, the opening bars of the Fantasy surge with drama and restlessness: over a foaming, turbulent left-hand figuration is heard a long, soulful outpouring of impassioned lyricism. The second movement, in the “heroic” key of E-flat major, contains two closely intertwined ideas: a proud march theme and a rhythmic figure of alternating short and long notes. The final movement evokes the spirit of the nocturne  ̶  dreamy, tender, a world without conflict.

Robert Markow