# Re: Menahem Pressler



## Knight769 (Mar 2, 2017)

*Re: Menahem Pressler*

I had the pleasure of watching in person, 94 year old pianist, Menahem Pressler, play last night at UCLA's Royce Hall, exactly 70 years after his debut in 1948. The highlight of the night for me was listening to the LA Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Thomas Dausgaard, play Mozart's #41 (Jupiter). In my opinion, the tempo was a bit fast. But it was very enjoyable to listen to. Here is what LA Times classical music critic, Mark Swed had to say about it:

It was a "humble reviewer's opinion," in an unsigned 1948 Los Angeles Times review of a 20-year-old pianist making his local debut in UCLA's Royce Hall, that Menachem Pressler, then the recent winner of a piano competition in San Francisco, "is the outstanding pianist of the younger generation.

"His command of dynamics is uncanny and his steel-like fingers plow into the keys with certitude and accuracy. Watch him. He has a great future."

In this reviewer's opinion (being humble gets you nowhere in this profession anymore), Pressler is the outstanding pianist of his present generation. Of course, he has no competition. Having turned 94 in December, Pressler proudly bills himself the oldest performing pianist today.

He played Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 23 with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra Tuesday night at the Alex Theatre in Glendale (where I heard him), and he has a Wednesday repeat at Royce (70 years after his debut there).

Sure enough, his command of dynamics remains uncanny for his age. The steel has but little tarnished; the certainty is not in question. As for accuracy, nonagenarian fingers not in need of a little time to limber up for rapid runs would be less uncanny than freakily artificial. A few flubbed passages at the beginning meant nothing: Watch him. He has a great future.

Pressler wasn't the only news for LACO's first concert of the new year. The orchestra is preparing to celebrate its 50th anniversary next year and is in the process of reinventing itself after Jeffrey Kahane's 20-year tenure as music director, which ended last season. The search for a new music director is ongoing; this season's guest conductors are presumably the main candidates.

Conductor Thomas Dausgaard's main contribution, other than his loving and steadying concerto accompaniment, was a buoyant and stylishly balanced performance of Mozart's last symphony, No. 41 ("Jupiter"). His gestures on the podium often have the manner of scooping up the music, as though it were a creamy ice cream. He also favors a glassy string sound and a finely calibrated balance of winds, brass and timpani. He made the players sound, and look, happy.


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## Taplow (Aug 13, 2017)

A remarkable performer, you are privileged indeed. I have long admired the work of the Beaux Arts Trio, of which he was not only a founding member, but the only original member to last its entire history. Their recordings of the Haydn piano trios is a sublime achievement - a desert island disc.

But I do fear the unnamed reviewer of that 1948 debut had one small detail incorrect. Mr Pressler would have been 25 at the time, not 20.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

After hearing the Beaux Arts Trio three or four times, I heard him in a solo concert back in the early 1970s. I now forget the exact makeup of the program, but I do remember a superb performance of Gaspard de la Nuit. I always remember the his nearly elfin demeanor while playing -- made me wonder whether he sleeps in his piano!


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Knight769 said:


> I"His command of dynamics is uncanny and his steel-like fingers plow into the keys with certitude and accuracy.


When I think of Pressler, I don't think of someone plowing into the keys. Am I wrong? To me, he seems to have a light touch. When he played at Vanderbilt about ten years ago, the reviewer noted that his light touch on a somewhat heavier-touched piano caused some notes not to sound.

Anyway, I agree with Taplow; you are privileged to have experienced this.


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## Knight769 (Mar 2, 2017)

Manxfeeder, you are 100% correct! Pressler has a light touch that is in total sync with the music that he is playing. I think the LA Times reviewer was incorrect when he described Pressler with the words: "And his steel-like fingers plow into the keys with certitude and accuracy." He didn't appear to be plowing into the keys at all. It was more of a graceful touch to me. 
I don't know if this makes any sense. But it sounded to me that he was able to control the sound better with that graceful touch.


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