| Date and venue | Title |
|---|---|
| 29-Apr-2013 Wigmore Hall | Preludes and pictures: Alexander Gavrylyuk debuts at Wigmore Hall |
 Stepping in for the indisposed Cédric Tiberghien, the Ukrainian-born Australian pianist Alexander Gavrylyuk wowed Wigmore Hall’s lunchtime audience with a debut concert replete in masterful displays of pianism, in the purest meaning of the word.
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| 22-Jan-2013 St Lawrence Centre For The Arts: Jane Mallett Theatre | Marc-André Hamelin makes his mark as composer-pianist in Toronto |
 The virtuoso pianist Marc-André Hamelin played a program of works by Bach, Fauré, Ravel and Rachmaninov, bracketed by his own Variations on a theme by Paganini. Last March in Toronto, when Hamelin snuck this piece into the program as an encore, I wrote that it was “ten minutes of the most fun you’ll ever have crowding around a piano at the end of party.” Now that the Variations are in the program, and Hyperion has recently issued Hamelin’s 12 Études in all the minor keys, we might as well begin identifying Hamelin as a “pianist-composer” in the same league as Rachmaninov.
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| 2-Dec-2012 The Royal Conservatory of Music, TELUS Centre, Koerner Hall | Thumbs up for Denis Matsuev's all-Russian concert at Koerner Hall |
 His build is blocky like the hockey defense-man he once was, but Denis Matsuev’s fingers can touch piano keys lightly as butterflies landing on begonias. The mood of his solo recital opened blissfully, like the January night by the fireplace described in Puskin’s poem “By the Hearth” which inspired the first of the twelve monthly miniatures Tchaikovsky published as The Seasons, Op. 37b. These are lyrical works that sing in folk and popular dance idioms of love and nostalgia for times gone by.Read full review... | |
| 19-Jun-2012 Royal Albert Hall | Valentina Lisitsa's Royal Albert Hall Debut |
 With more than 30 million YouTube channel views, there is simply no doubt that Valentina Lisitsa is already a classical music star to contend with. Not content with being any ordinary internet superstar, in the run-up to her Royal Albert Hall debut, the Ukrainian pianist uploaded videos of her practice sessions, announced her intention to stream the concert across the globe, and even went so far as to allow the audience to pick the programme via the internet.
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