September 16, 2006
Pianist makes brilliant return to Charleston

By David Williams
For Saturday Gazette-Mail

The pianist Yakov Kasman made a brilliant return to Charleston Friday with the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra, the ensemble he memorably bailed out of trouble in May 2005 as a last-minute replacement in Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 3. This time he played Prokofiev’s Second Piano Concerto, with just as memorable a result.

The Prokofiev is one of those concertos that engulf the pianist in piles of notes played often at break-neck speed or in thickets of chords. In the midst of this, melodies emerge, sometimes soaring, sometimes sneaking out of a harmonic mist.

Kasman has a gorgeous sound and a ferociously precise technique that let him explore the music’s intricacies passionately and lucidly. In the end of the opening movement’s huge cadenza and in the bewildering complexities of the finale, the piano rang sonorously without sounding like he was pummeling the instrument into submission.

His lighter touch drove the fire-on-the-keys second movement and the nimble spinning arpeggios of the third’s off-kilter march.

Grant Cooper conducted with his usual assurance and the orchestra responded with a brilliance that matched Kasman. The tonal variety from the lower sections of brass, winds and strings, not to mention some stunning bass drum sounds, was striking. Only some timpani notes, struck slightly late, detracted.

Brahms’ Symphony No. 2 may have been overplayed in the former conductor Thomas Conlin’s tenure, but Cooper had not touched on any of the composer’s symphonies before this concert. His interpretation seemed almost neoclassical in approach, putting emphasis on line and clarity of counterpoint over Romantic expressiveness. The results were fresh and welcome, and the orchestra played beautifully, especially in the wonderful middle movements where the composer constantly restates his ideas but never in the same way with the same instruments.

The concert opened with the odd choice of Beethoven’s “Egmont” Overture. Pairing Beethoven with Brahms, when the Beethoven is an overture, seems a little too cautious for the 21st century, especially when there are so many other short pieces from which to chose (and this is a season that lacks a defining presence of American music). Critical grousing aside, the “Egmont” was played with tight ensemble, struck a hauntingly pale tone in the center and ended with heroic brass aplenty.

The concert repeats tonight at 8 p.m. at the Clay Center.  [top]

Rick Justice
Friday September 15, 2006

In August 1913, the year Sergei Prokofiev premiered his "Piano Concerto No.2 in G minor," the air in St. Petersburg Russia was charged with thoughts of anarchy. And nowhere was this more obvious than in the arts.

The poet Akhmatova wrote "Rosary," Kandinsky painted "All Saints II," and Stravinsky premiered "The Rite of Spring" with the Ballets Russes.

Still the Tzarist gentry didn't get it.

All things considered, it's no wonder that the audience for Prokofiev's performance started to indignantly take leave of the hall from the very beginning and the few who remained until the end booed and hissed.

Prokofiev, on the other hand, bowed defiantly to the near empty hall and played an encore.

Pianist Yakov Kasman brought a great deal of this earthy attitude with him to the Clay Center Thursday night during a rehearsal with the West Virginia Symphony, as he drove home over and over the rhythmic piling-up of notes and outlandish dissonant forces that take the musical events to the limits of tonality.

Conductor Grant Cooper and the symphony hitched up their breeches and joined Kasman in this wild and crazy ride.

The symphony will perform the work for audiences tonight and Saturday.

The pianistic work relies very little on orchestral accompaniment, but what is required of the orchestra are sharp jabbing punches that have to be very precisely synchronized to Kasman's "Nantucket Sleigh Ride."

I couldn't help but think that I hope that Kasman is being paid a flat salary, because if he charged by the note, the symphony budget would be in grave danger.

Cooper et al began the evening with Beethoven's "Egmont Overture."

This seemingly simple and familiar work will be much cleaner on tonight's opening night when the second violins and violas commit more focus on the rhythm bed that the rest of the orchestra sections perform on.

Last but not least will be a performance of Brahms' "Symphony No. 2 in D Major."

This broad, melodically developed expanse of sound color is just the thing Cooper and his band excel in the most, and I am sure that if you go -- and go you should -- you will be revived by the sound of music played with excellence.

One last thing.

Be sure to take along a spare pair of socks, because Kasman, Cooper and friends will surely knock your first pair off.

Concert time today and Saturday is 8 p.m.  [top]

Saturday Gazette-Mail - Saturday, September 14, 2006
By David Williams

Pianist Yakov Kasman bailed the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra out in May 2005, when he substituted for the ailing Olga Kern. He arrived just before the Friday concert and, with only a few minutes to talk with conductor Grant Cooper about tempos, he performed the notoriously difficult Rachmaninov Third Piano Concerto without any rehearsal.

In the review of the performance I wrote, “If he was bothered by the tension of the moment, he hid it easily behind a blazing tone balanced by an intellectual calm that displayed Rachmaninoff’s densest counterpoint with élan.”

On Friday and Saturday, Charleston audiences will get to hear what happens when Kasman actually gets a chance to rehearse with the orchestra. He’ll play Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 2 in G Minor as soloist for the opening nights of the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra’s 2006-2007 season. [Full Article...]  [top]

If the Magic City Chamber Festival plays out anything like its inaugural concert, its future is assured.

Not only did the idea of a mid-summer musical soiree in heat-soaked Alabama resonate with a sold-out audience, the music-making Friday was top drawer - as good as you'll find at any big-name mountain or seaside get-together.

True, the Reynolds-Kirschbaum Recital Hall at the Alys Stephens Center seats only 162, but cautious organizers of the fledgling festival wanted to start small. Perhaps too small.

The ASC Chamber Players, an ad hoc chamber group playing its first concert, played a thrilling concert, thanks in large part to pianist Yakov Kasman's take-charge musicianship.

But his five collaborators turned in inspired performances as well. Together, they engulfed the tiny hall with sound in Brahms' Piano Quartet in C minor, Op. 60.

Biting accents and broad, free-flowing phrases defined the opening movement, exaggerated at times but not excessively so. The Scherzo was a breathless romp, taken at a torrid pace, contrasting well with the lyricism in the Andante.

This was an intelligent reading of this quartet. These musicians understood the rhythmic pliability, momentum-building and ebbs and flows of this thickly scored work, and they executed well.

UAB faculty clarinetist Denise Gainey was front and center for Prokofiev's folkish "Overture on Hebrew Themes," offering charming, unforced solos in this breezy reading.

Shostakovich will be played at each of the festival's three concerts, commemorating the composer's 100th birthday. The Piano Trio No. 2, Op. 67, is one of the finest examples of 20th century chamber music, and it was given its due.

A stark, empty landscape begins the piece, cellist Dennis Parker delivering the eerie harmonics. But the Shostakovich's mood swings soon took hold, the dizzying fury of the second movement lapsing into a frolicsome spree. Violinist Karen Bentley Pollick, whose solid musicianship came through consistently, was at her expressive best in the Largo.

The evening's best playing came in the finale. Driven by Kasman's gritty facial expressions and body movement, its wry humor and kineticism were communicated brilliantly and infectiously.   [top]

Yakov Kasman returned to Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall on Saturday for another triumphant performance of a Rachmaninoff piano concerto - proving his 2004 feat was no fluke.
Eighteen months after rescuing the Rach 3, Yakov Kasman returns to tackle No.1

By David Stabler
The Oregonian

     The pianist Yakov Kasman moseyed across the stage of Schnitzer Hall with a hangdog look Saturday night. He bowed obediently without smiling and sat down.
     The audience's welcome couldn't have been warmer - they remembered Kasman's daring, triumphant, improbable rescue of the symphony's Rachmaninoff's Concerto No.3 just 18 months ago.
     Still, Kasman knew the demands that lay ahead of him, and his body looked as though it didn't want to cooperate.
     But the moment he touched the piano, a great shuddering and exploding erupted. His hands shot across the keys, a blur of speed and almost predatory urgency. In the next 25 minutes, Kasman gave one of the more mesmerizing performances of Rachmaninoff's Concerto No.1 that I have ever heard.
     Kasman's brilliant performance combined sheer aggression with swooning romanticism, confirming that he is a remarkable pianist- powerful, measured, deeply serious, but also a little dangerous. He flirts with the devil. [Full Article...]  [top]

Nacion (San Jose Costa Rica) May 30 , 2005

    La segunda, el viernes 27, contó con la actuación, como solista en el piano, de Yakov Kasman, virtuoso y pedagogo ruso, ahora radicado en Estados Unidos.

    El concierto brindó homenaje al gran compositor, director de orquesta y pianista ruso Serguei Rajmáninov (1873-1943) y estuvo dedicado a la memoria de Sophia Wanamaker, nieta del compositor.

    Hay una conexión estrecha entre Costa Rica y la estirpe de Rajmáninov. Sophia contrajo matrimonio con el diplomático estadounidense Temple Wanamaker, quien cumplió una misión aquí, y posteriormente la pareja se radicó en el país y fueron benefactores del CCCN. Descendientes de los Wanamaker aún residen en Costa Rica.

    La función comenzó con la interpretación monumental que Kasman moldeó de la Sonata N° 1, opus 8, de Rajmáninov, estrenada en Moscú en 1908.

    Es la única de sus obras para piano solo que el compositor no estrenó personalmente y sus tres movimientos están inspirados en el Fausto, de Goethe.

    Rajmáninov describió la sonata como "salvaje e interminable". Él era un virtuoso imponente en el piano y la pieza requiere de una técnica
prodigiosa de parte del intérprete, que Kasman posee de pleno.

    En la fluidez de la frase musical y en los contrastes sutiles de dinámica y ritmo, Kasman también mostró una delicada sensibilidad que
complementó sus colosales dotes técnicos.

    La obra no se interpreta a menudo y nunca antes la había escuchado en concierto. Probablemente también sea la primera vez que se ejecuta en público en el país.....

    Para finalizar, Yakov Kasman y David Sabee modelaron una lectura ponderada y ardorosa de la Sonata en sol menor, para violonchelo y piano, opus 19, de Rajmáninov, que data de 1901, y, fuera de programa, respondieron a los nutridos aplausos de una sala llena con Vocalise, del mismo compositor.  [top]

West Virginia Gazette-mail

Charleston WV

May 07, 2005

Last-minute replacement impressive

By David Williams
For Sunday Gazette-Mail

Olga Kern, the 2001 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition Gold Medalist and the scheduled pianist for the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra's concert last night, fell ill during Friday night's rehearsal. Ill enough that she could not perform.

The orchestra managed to find a replacement, Yakov Kasman, who arrived by airplane an hour and a half before last night's concert.

So without rehearsal, Kasman and orchestra performed Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, arguably one of the most difficult of all piano concertos. Not only does the keyboard part boast the composer's complex, note-deluged textures, but the music requires a ceaseless give and take between pianist and orchestra.

The result was extraordinary.

Kasman is a Van Cliburn medalist himself, Silver in 1997. And as a Russian born, a certain intimacy with the Rachmaninoff would be expected.

Still to step in at the last moment, without any rehearsal, left the potential for musical disaster ever-present.

It never happened, nor did it ever feel like it might happen. Conductor Grant Cooper's brilliance as an accompanist had a lot to do with
it. He constantly kept the orchestra on course matching Kasman's powerful surges in tempo.

Kasman played even the thorniest passages with the utmost clarity. If he was bothered by the tension of the moment, he hid it easily behind a
blazing tone balanced by an intellectual calm that displayed Rachmaninoff's densest counterpoint with élan.

Cooper kept the orchestra well back in the texture, probably because he did not know how loudly Kasman would play in certain passages. So
sometimes softer wind solos were a little covered by the piano, but that is my only gripe in an otherwise sensational performance.

The audience's tremendous ovation mixed shouts of acclaim with the thunder of feet hammering on the floor of the balconies. The orchestra
showed its appreciation of Kasman with a vigorous ovation of its own.  [top]

The State Journal-Register (Springfield IL) May 1st 2005

Kasman adds spark to ISO performance

By NICK ROGERS
ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR

Rarely has an Illinois Symphony Orchestra audience leaped so swiftly and rightfully to its feet for a guest artist as it did Saturday for Russian pianist Yakov Kasman.

He barely had played his final note before a standing ovation erupted for his dynamic performance of Sergei Rachmaninov's "Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini."

As captivating with his fluid, flawless playing as he was with his sly, spirited body language, Kasman was the brilliant centerpiece at the ISO's final Masterworks concert of the 2004-05 season at Sangamon Auditorium.

When Rachmaninov's piece premiered in 1934, its scope - an introduction and 24 wildly different variations in just more than 21 minutes - reaffirmed his then-waning status as a composer. It's easy to hear why. The ever-changing work moves from buoyant explosions to harp-like effects and brisk progressions up the scale.

The basic theme, taken from a virtuoso 19th-century violinist, embedded itself firmly in the brain, even as Kasman and the orchestra marvelously morphed it through tempo and tone. In a matter of measures, Kasman went from delicately dropping a cascade of chords to plunking with immediacy.

In those moments, he pounced on the melody like a cat, bobbing his head and stomping his feet in time with his deft hands. And during quieter passages, Kasman leaned slightly and dangled his fingers over the piano before a soft application....  [top]

Pianist performs with grace, passion

By MARY KUNZ GOLDMAN
News Classical Music Critic
The Buffalo News
3/7/2005

Pianist Yakov Kasman appeared with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra on Saturday night, playing Scriabin's lovely, bracing Piano Concerto in F Sharp Minor, Op. 20. His performance was the highlight of a very enjoyable concert that also included the Symphonic Poem No. 3 of Liszt's "Les Preludes" and Beethoven's Fourth Symphony.

Kasman, who was born in Russia and now teaches at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, is a gem of a pianist, as interesting to watch as he is to listen to. He's not theatrical in any traditional sense. His looks and bearing are unpretentious. Once he sits down at the piano, though, he's strangely riveting.

He began the Scriabin concerto with flawless grace and went on to display a marvelously light and flexible touch. Though he sat still for the most part, he would often lift a hand about a foot and a half off the keyboard, then lower it abruptly but with remarkable grace to land on the keys just so. His legato lines were smooth and rapturous. The slow movement, with its enchanting high-treble passages like the song of a bird, was especially entrancing.

Kasman's tone was controlled and on the quiet side, but he communicated a sense of passion and a strong rhythmic foundation. One got the impression, too, that he was very much in the spirit of the music. From time to time, when he wasn't playing, he couldn't resist twisting his body to the playing of the orchestra. He and guest conductor Daniel Hege were an efficient team, maintaining unusually constant eye contact, navigating the music's hills and turns with the grace of a couple of skiers.

In short, it was a romantic performance of an intriguing, challenging piece we don't often get a chance to hear, and the audience loved it, rewarding the low-key Kasman with a standing ovation and calls of "Bravo!"

Perhaps because the Scriabin was such a rarity, the rest of the program was on the conventional side. The popular third symphonic poem from Liszt's "Les Preludes," always a great guilty pleasure, got an extra boost from the BPO's magnificent trombone section. Our orchestra always shines in textured, colorful works like this.

And Beethoven's Fourth Symphony, a relatively lightweight chaser to what had gone before, brimmed with personality. Hege and the orchestra brought out its many syncopations with bombast and style. The stomping Minuet, a jarring take on the old dance form, had a good rebellious spirit, and the strings filled the finale with vigor and energy.

e-mail: mkunz@buffnews.com

  [top]

A round-the-clock race to rescue the Rach

Wednesday, October 06, 2004

DAVID STABLER
The Oregonian

... The audience, aware that the pianist had just landed in Portland, greeted him with a surge of applause.

Kalmar raised his baton and the orchestra entered. Kasman, keeping his eyes fixed on the conductor, lowered his hands to the keys.

What followed defies explanation.

From the first notes, Kasman sailed through the music, playing the massive chords with voluptuous tone and even inserting a playful quip now and then. He missed a few notes at the top of some breakneck leaps, but nothing that disturbed the music's texture. Most extraordinary, his playing transcended the notes, difficult as they were, and took on the natural, assured quality of a storyteller enjoying his tale.

The final, thundering chords had him standing straight up off the bench.

Welch rocketed out of his seat, shouting with joy. Around him, the audience erupted with cheers. [Full Article...]

  [top]

Oregon Symphony
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 6, 2004

YAKOV KASMAN JETS CROSS-COUNTRY TO DELIVER AMAZING PERFORMANCE OF RACHMANINOFF'S PIANO CONCERTO NO. 3

Russian pianist Yakov Kasman, who made his American debut winning the silver medal in the Tenth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in 1997, made his Portland debut Oct. 4 as the pinch hitter on Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 with Music Director Carlos Kalmar and the Oregon Symphony. Kasman, who arrived from Birmingham, Ala. one hour before showtime, amazed the audience and critics with a stunning performance of the difficult concerto that had the crowd on its feet.

Kasman replaced scheduled soloist Louis Lortie, who notified the orchestra just prior to Sunday's concert that he was unable to perform due to tendonitis in his right arm. Kalmar and the orchestra substituted Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 4 for the second half of the Sunday evening performance.

"It is always unfortunate when unexpected circumstances cause last-minute changes in the program," said Ryberg. "However, no one could have predicted what an incredible success each of the concerts would be; I am extremely grateful to Carlos, Yakov, the orchestra and the administrative team for making that possible."

Since winning the Van Cliburn medal, Kasman has appeared as a soloist with more than 40 orchestras in the United States, Russia and Asia. He has 14 recordings with Calliope and Harmonia Mundi; his recording of Shostakovich's Concerto No. 1 and Schnittke's Concerto for Piano and Strings received the "Choc de Monde de la Musique" award in France, was rated highest by "Classics Today"and referred to as "superlative" by the American Record Guide. Kasman is a Professor of Piano and Artist-in-Residence at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. For more information on Kasman, visit www.yakovkasman.com.   [top]

Translation from review in national newspaper in Spain [Review in Spanish...]
Yakov Kasman’s Performance with the Orquestra Simfonica de Baleares of Prokofiev Concerto #2
May 2004.

There was also an exceptional guest performer that evening, the Russian pianist Yakov Kasman, probably one of the most outstanding figures in our symphony orchestra’s seasonal program. The concert is a true test for the interpreter, and, immediately Kasman made it clear that the language of the keyboard held no secrets for him, neither in technique or in virtuosity. It has been infrequent during this season to see the solo artist receive six encore calls from the audience, and he chose Rachmaninov to express gratitude for such a warm reception, and by doing so, he counter balanced hardness of the Prokofiev concerto. Conductor Edmon Colomer reencountered the Russian pianist six years after interpreting this same concert together in Lille, and he did so with an orchestra that already sounds compact, ready to transcend the challenges with the highest accolade that will surely mark those contained in the 2004 - 2005 season.   [top]

Piano concert trio dishes up gourmet musical feast

03/01/04

MICHAEL HUEBNER
News staff writer

Birmingham - an international piano mecca? With well-known pianists at the area's four colleges and universities, the high-quality UAB Piano Series and the three-day "Spotlight on Piano," it could happen.

Jointly sponsored by the Alabama Symphony Orchestra, Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame and Forbes Piano and Organ, "Spotlight" showcased three pianists Saturday, each with distinct musical personalities. Like last year's triple treat, which headlined Christopher O'Riley, it was a gourmet feast of music-making. Unlike that inaugural event, acoustics were ideal, organizers wisely moving it from the clunky Wright Center to the sleek Jemison Concert Hall.

Eugen Indjic got things started. In Chopin's Piano Concerto No. 2 in F minor, he proved to be a soloist's soloist, continually challenging the ASO and music director Richard Westerfield to keep pace with his impetuous tempo changes. The pianist's overused sustain pedal made for some muddy textures, which in turn contributed to the orchestra's sluggish accompaniment. Indjic's most lyrical moments came in the Larghetto, in which the orchestra provides little more than sustained harmonies, and in the colorful cascades of scales in the finale.

Katherine Chi told a different story with Mozart's Piano Concerto in D minor, K. 466. Much more of a team player than Indjic, she laid out Mozart's formal vision urgently and decisively, which allowed the orchestra to interject bold, sweeping gestures and pinpoint phrasing. Chi is a master of Mozartean opposites - anticipation and resolve, tension and release - as well as an insightful interpreter with a sensitive touch. Her passionate side came through in the finale, she and Westerfield bonding with echoed phrases and push-and-pull dramatics.

Showmanship honors went to UAB pianist Yakov Kasman. Despite the glut of recordings and orchestra programs with Rachmaninoff's popular Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, the pianist seemed to tell every other pianist how it should be done. Conviction, power and intensity are no strangers to Kasman, but add symbiotic rapport, and it adds up to an electrifying performance.

This reading riveted at every turn, from the slow, deliberate build at the opening to the tiny major-minor shifts and pounding chords in the final movement. Most remarkable was the chemistry between pianist and orchestra. Kasman's constant eye contact with Westerfield and orchestral soloists ensured its single-mindedness, inspiring fine work from hornist David Pandolfi, flutist Lisa Wienhold and clarinetist Daniel Granados as well.   [top]

Copyright 2004 al.com. All Rights Reserved.

Conductor Falletta, Kasman on piano join ASO in riveting, stellar evening
The Birmingham News/Birmingham Post-Herald
Saturday, May 17, 2003

Music Review
By Michael Huebner
News staff writer

The Alabama Symphony saved some of its best for last.

Featuring one of America's finest conductors and a Birmingham-based pianist whose international career is on the rise, their season finale Friday at the Alys Stephens Center riveted from beginning to end.

Guest conductor JoAnn Falletta opened with Barber's "Overture to the School for Scandal," one of the composer's more acerbic but lushly-scored works. Vigorous tempos were the rule, and they were handled deftly by the orchestra. More memorable, though, were the gently caressed melodies imparted by the strings and solo wind players.

One of Alexander Scriabin's early works came next. The Piano Concerto in F-sharp minor was written before the composer became a mystic and theosophist, assigned colors to key schemes and created "mystic" harmonies. Shades of Rachmaninoff permeate the concerto, but Chopin seeps through occasionally, as well as reminiscences of Greig's A minor Piano Concerto.

Pianist Yakov Kasman threw every ounce of his small frame into this performance, brilliantly tossing off runs and dramatic flourishes in the outer movements, refusing to shy away from eccentricities.

The slow second movement combined passion and grace, Kasman's silvery tone a perfect complement to the strings-alone melodies. The finale was especially inspired, transfixing at times, as the cosmically-minded composer would have liked. Remarkably, this was a first performance of the piece for both Kasman and Falletta.

Falletta took an aggressive stance for Brahms' Symphony No. 1, cajoling the orchestra with a broad, sweeping baton and animated gestures. The results were razor-sharp accents, a taut ensemble and the most resonant, electrically-charged string playing all season.   [top]

Review of August 9, 2001 performance
with the Peninsula Music Festival
Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No. 2
Victor Yampolsky, conductor

...In between these works, a major 20th-century concerto was the vehicle through which we were introduced to a remarkable pianist. ...

The soloist was Yakov Kasman, slight of physical stature but lacking nothing in power - or anything else for that matter.  Tensed but not tense, he let his strength flow from his shoulders directly down his upper arms, to the forearms, wrists and fingers.  Nothing wasted.  In a work usually thrashed and pummeled, he brought forth wave after wave of fathomless, ringing tone while keeping instantly available a subtly rounded pianissimo for passages of contrast.  Kasman's musicianship is also of the highest order and he found every filament of substance and suggestion within the concerto.  So absolute a term as consummate still seems inadequate for his art.  This gentleman is a pianist.  [top]
 

For nearly 1,000 elated concertgoers, Thursday night's performance of Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 by pianist Yakov Kasman and the Alabama Symphony was the stuff dreams are made of. 

For here we experienced a pianist with penetrating insight applying his astonishing technical wizardry to a unique vision of one of music's most beloved concerti in a manner that was intimate yet all-encompassing. 

We knew the piece, every note of it, but the entirety was sculpted with a mercurial freshness and dazzling interplay of light and shadow that we'd never before imagined. 

The response at the concerto's flamboyant conclusion was a resounding roar from the crowd. No uncertainty here: People leapt to their feet and wouldn't let Kasman go until the house lights came up as a signal that it was time to go home. 

After winning the silver medal at the 1997 Van Cliburn Competition, Kasman relocated from Moscow to Huntsville as artist-in-residence at the University of Alabama at Huntsville, where he's found a warmly supportive environment and a devoted following. 

Comparing Thursday's concert to his impressive but occasionally overbearing early post Cliburn outings, the
pianist has softened and deepened into an artist of a maturity and depth beyond his years. 

Most remarkable here was the contrasting emotional terrain that he navigated with assurance and singleness of
purpose. These ranged from passages of dark melancholy through the excruciating beauty of Rachmaninoff's far-flung melodies to occasional bursts of playful impetuosity. In those lighter moments one marveled at the manner in which the notes spilled effortlessly from the instrument and out into the hall like water down a brilliantly illuminated mountainside; in more introspective passages, one felt a pull of inevitability between the notes that kept us focused on the music and its direction, rather than on the performer and his prowess. 

Following an invigorating reading of Sibelius' Karelia Suite on the first half of this well-planned concert, Richard Westerfield gained a houseful of Sibelius converts using the unlikely vehicle of the composer's Symphony No. 7.  The symphony is rarely welcomed and even less well understood. But Westerfield breathed life into its pages with clarity and warmth.  [top]

But for a memory lapse, Russian pianist Yakov Kasman might have won the 10th Van Cliburn International Competition in 1997. Instead American Jon Nakamatsu won the gold, Kasman was awarded the silver medal, and listeners went home remembering Kasman's stunning, flamboyantly colored performances.

Although Kasman won two years' worth of concert dates as part of his award, it took three years for him to get to Boston. Then, it wasn't one of the major presenters who arranged his local debut. Instead, the enterprising Boston Conservatory and Michael Lewin, coordinator of the Piano Masters Series, engaged him for a recital in Seully Hall. The choice of date was not propitious, conflicting as it did with the season-opening performances of both the Boston Symphony and the Boston Ballet. As a result, there was a small turnout for what was indeed an extraordinary concert.

Born in Orel, near Moscow, and formerly a professor of piano at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, Kasman is a slight, dark, bearded man with an air of intensity and coiled energy. It must be the harnessing of that energy rather than the pianist's physical stature that accounts for the colossal amplitude of sound he can produce. This listener has seldom heard anyone, other than Garrick Ohlsson, who pours on the tone so torrentially. Not only does he have a huge sound, but he also has diabolical fleetness of fingers and pinpoint accuracy. Along with these titanium chops, though, he possesses the soul of a poet and sensibility of a painter.

For his Boston program, Kasman focused on character pieces - either those intended to be performed sequentially in sets, like Mussorgsky's ''Pictures at an Exhibition, '' or independent pieces, such as the Preludes from Scriabin's Op. 22 and 37.  This gave him free rein to exercise his musical fantasy, to range over a wide pictorial landscape.

Opening with the Mussorgsky, Kasman seemed to find the piano almost too constricting in its volume and available hues. His performance clearly yearned after an orchestral palette. The opening Promenade alternated statements of terrific power with responses of a veiled, echolike character.  ''The Old Castle'' had a grave, melancholy air; the ''Tuileries'' was marked by great delicacy, fluidity, and clarity of passage work; ''Limoges'' was full of the jabber, shoving, and bustle of the marketplace; and ''Samuel Goldberg and Schmuyle'' pitted a pompous, sententious braggart against a whining, timid petitioner.

Sometimes Kasman asked too much of the piano and the acoustics of the room: The sound became clangorous and muddy. But mostly the playing was viscerally thrilling.

In Schumann's ''Waldszenen (Forest Scenes), '' Kasman offered a welcome contrast with more lyrical music. The ''Eintritt (Entrance)'' was tenderly songful. Here again, the pieces were beautifully differentiated, with highlights being the eerie ''Verrufene Stelle (Haunted Spot), '' the galvanizing ''Jagdlied(Hunting Song) '' in which one could almost hear the galloping hoofs.

Eight Preludes by Scriabin found the composer in more lucid and cogent form than we often attribute to him. The first Andante from Op. 22 featured strange, bittersweet harmonies and a tragic mood; an Allegretto suggested Chopin in its figuration and harmonies; and the Andantino was a passionate outpouring of song with rich accompaniment. In these, we may have heard the most consistently beautiful playing of the evening.

But it was the three movements from Stravinsky's ''Petrouchka'' that knocked everyone's socks off. If Kasman's piano were a painter's palette, it would have featured every color from shrieking oranges to shadowy purples to diaphanous silver - all these seemed to come into play in this most vivid performance of the ballet excerpts. And the emotional temperature of the playing ran from the deepest tenderness to brutal violence. 

Kasman recently took up a new appointment as artist in residence at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. Therefore, he is not a long way from Boston. If the musical gods are just, the pianist will be invited back to play here frequently and in more prominent venues like the symphony and the Celebrity Series.   [top]

REVIEW - MUSIC - CLASSICAL
YAKOV KASMAN \ CONCERT
By Christian Rix 
Special To The Post-Dispatch

Lovers of the romantic piano repertoire who did not come out to Monday night's recital by Yakov Kasman probably should have been kicking themselves the morning after. Kasman, the slightly built and demonic looking Russian piano virtuoso who now makes his home in this country, made his appearance at the Sheldon as part of the University of Missouri at St. Louis Premiere Performances series.

In contrast to what seems to be the normal practice everywhere, the program opened precisely at 8 p.m. Kasman charged into the opening promenade of Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition." Sparks seem to fly from the fingers of this musician and he will never be interrupted by inappropriate applause between movements because he scarcely pauses for a single breath before plunging on.

Some might feel that the pace on the more stately portions of the Mussorgsky was a bit rushed, but to me it seemed part and parcel of Kasman's impressive energy. The movements like "Ballet of the Unhatched" that are expected to be taken at a rapid pace are simply astounding. Keep in mind though that the swiftness of his approach is not the defining characteristic of his style, just the natural outcome of his crackling intensity at the keyboard.

What can a pianist do after leading off with this famous Mussorgsky showpiece?  Anything else would ordinarily seem anti-climactic. But Kasman was not intimidated. After intermission he leapt into a strongly contrasting set of works with Schumann's Waldszenen. Seen through Kasman's eyes, the usually dreamy Germanic world of Schumann becomes vigorous and even muscular, though never vulgar.

The program then finished by heading back to Russia for a dazzling rendition of Eight Preludes, Op. 22 and Op. 37 by Alexander Scriabin, and Stravinsky's own transcriptions of three scenes from Petrouchka.

Kasman was a joy not just because he is a technically proficient pianist, but because in a day when the omnipresence of recordings leads to a homogenization of style he has a strongly individual and distinctive voice.  [top]

Jan 25, 2000 - Full Throttle Performances and Rapture Thrill at the Reno Phil 

"Damn the torpedoes" isn't conductor Barry Jekowsky's main aim for the Reno Philharmonic, but "full speed ahead" might be.

Whether in rehearsal or performance, Jekowsky seems to have everyone convinced that what they do musically while he's around is the most important event in the entire universe. A white-hot intensity permeates Jekowsky's work, not to mention a spirit of adventure and discovery. 

Tuesday's (1/25/2000) program of Bernstein's jaunty Three Dance Episodes from "On the Town," Grieg's lush Piano Concerto in A Minor, rapturously played by Russian pianist Yakov Kasman, and Tchaikovsky's fateful, often smashingly full throttle Symphony No. 4, was but another of the maestro's exciting mixes of highly popular and listenable symphonic music. 

The biggest plus, of course, is that these concerts don't just look exciting on paper, they're exciting to hear. The Tchaikovsky might  very will have been the fastest performance of the Fourth in captivity. 

The "On The Town" lyric, "New York, New York, it's a helluva town" catches the spirit of Bernstein's dance episodes, but no more so than the devil-may-care Jekowsky and the Reno Philhamonic brought to these thoroughly American pieces. The syncopated maestro and his phrase-bending orchestra met the offbeat Mr. Bernstein on mutual home turf and it was a terrific blending of homegrown American talent. Irreverence was the name of the game for these bawdy, loose-jointed pieces. Add the pizzazz of with-it soloing from within the orchestra's ranks - the blowzy bluesiness of trumpeter Paul Lenz, to name one - and all the Bernstein
lacked was the superlative dancing of Gene Kelly and Ann Miller. With lots of brassy edge, smart alecky woodwinds, shimmering strings with velvety sheen and percussion with rhythm to spare, the Bernstein episodes were dazzlers.

In a complete reversal of fortune, the Grieg received one of the most poetically sensitive readings I've heard - a seamless collaboration between soloist and orchestra. Kasman gave the concerto a freely romantic treatment. Seemingly at once he was an extroverted virtuoso and an introspective, sensitive poet. It was this middle ground between poetics and virility and Kasman's sublime liquidity of phrasing that served the Grieg's romanticism with just the right doses of heroics and restraint. Tremendous impetuosity and dash marked the main body of the finale for a reading of drive and rhythmic bite, while an ethereal serenity enveloped the second movement making it an utterance of radiance and touching simplicity. Jekowsky provided a most rhapsodic underpinning. The orchestra provided taut, full-bodied support. It was a superlative performance of a too seldom heard masterpiece.

Fate, eloquent melody, pathos and rhythmic intensity are everywhere in the Tchaikovsky - all ingredients that make Tchaikovsky the man in the street's most popular symphonist. Because the "Fourth" is more than just lots of fast notes, poignancy and lyricism abound, the challenge is to hang onto the symphony's thrill of split-second bombast, while carefully mining its pathos, intimate moments and lovely melodies. Jekowsky imparted an unerring, natural flow to the music and exhibited an affinity for highlighting the little details that mark great performances. Jekowsky managed the symphony's grand moments in a firm and commanding manner; just when the music should break free with liberated passion, it did. The quiet moments were beautifully shaped and focused. The exquisite solo work by oboist Andrea Lenz and clarinetist Brian Schweickhardt were especially noteable contributions.  The orchestra was at all times responsive to the demands of its conductor. It was a wonderfully controlled, superb presentation.

And so the love affair between Reno symphony goers, Maestro Jekowsky's musical stylishness and spirit of adventure and the orchestra's exciting performances continues. Tuesday's capacity Pioneer Center audience loved, and rightfully so, every minute of what it heard.

The next Reno Philharmonic subscription concert will be March 7, 2000. The program will feature violinist Phillip Ruder playing Glazunov's Violin Concerto in A Minor, Ron Nelson's Savannah River Holiday Sketches and Mahler's Symphony No. 1. All Reno Philharmonic subscription concerts are played at the Pioneer Center for the Performing Arts, 100 South Virginia Street, Reno. For information call 775-323-6393.  [top]

MUSIC REVIEW

Yakov Kasman: A Competitive Warrior Displays His Softer Side
By BERNARD HOLLAND

Yakov Kasman is a pianist with all the weapons of the competition warrior, but there was hope coming from his recital at the 92nd Street Y on Saturday night that his playing offers other, finer properties as well. The opening movements of Haydn's G major Sonata (Hob. XVI:40) and Prokofiev's Sonata No. 8 could not be more different in tone and texture, yet both were organized in the same thoughtful way. In their beginnings one could predict their endings. 

Kasman, in other words, sees a sonata movement as a single arc and paves our passageway along it with care. This is a pianist whose interest seems more in the music itself than in music as a means to impress the devotee of piano personalities and techniques. 

But competition warrior he has been: silver medalist at the most recent Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, a higher-up in the finals of the 1992 Arthur Rubinstein Competition and second-prize holder at the Prokofiev Competition in his native Russia. Now Kasman seems to be moving on: touring, recording, with teaching posts at the Moscow Conservatory and the University of Alabama. 

The militant strain of Soviet-style music education has been largely subdued in this particular pianist, but it surfaces when the opportunities present themselves. The Vivace-Allegro movement of the Prokofiev is a harrowing exercise in violence, and Kasman's reveled in every thunderous chord and run. No amount of speed threatens the clarity of his playing or his coolness under pressure. He is correct in treating Haydn's Presto movement as a fast-moving machine threatened by its own eccentricity. I think the joke would have been more effectively put across with a slightly slower, more humanizing tempo. Mechanical, yes, but flesh and blood as well. 

Such anomalies of scale poked out occasionally from what was a satisfying evening. Schumann's "Jäger auf der Lauer" sounded much too grand and booming for the judicious, gentle musicality being practised around it. In Medtner's G minor Sonata, on the other hand, Kasman found a welcome home for his big ideas and sprinting fingers. Stravinsky's Three Movements From "Petrouchka" at the end of the concert were a theatrical delight. The vivid splashes and metric surprises are there in the music waiting for someone who, first of all, has the vision to find them, and second, possesses sufficient poise and virtuosity to betray neither breathlessness nor apprehension.  [top]