Narek Hakhnazaryan/Oxana Shevchenko
Narek Hakhnazaryan/Oxana Shevchenko
RCS, Glasgow
Michael Tumelty
WHAT a sensation yesterday at the recital given as part of Radio 3's series of live broadcasts, running through the week under the title, Tchaikovsky in Miniature. We got that, and much more, from the stupendous young Armenian cellist Narek Hakhnazaryan, accompanied with extraordinary delicacy by "she with fingers of steel" Oxana Shevchenko, the Kazakhstani winner of the 2010 Scottish International Piano Competition, here demonstrating her quite beautiful prowess as an accompanist of the first order.
But what on earth do we say about the amazing Hakhnazaryan? It was all there, in every note he played in a huge programme that opened with Tchaikovsky's lovely D minor Nocturne, leading effortlessly into the same composer's Pezzo Capriccioso, redefining the word capricious as he swept it off its heels, before bounding through Shostakovich's Cello Sonata in D minor, which almost burst at the seams with character, drive, wit, intensity, bite and sheer comprehension. There are not too many young cellists, even the most dazzling virtuosi, who have such a comprehensive command of their instrument, its techniques and the intellectual acuity required to penetrate and release the core of the music to the blindingly impressive degree of this Armenian.
As straight faced as he is on stage, he is up for a challenge too. He turned theatrical, intoning through Mikhail Bronner's haunting opus, Jew: Life and Death, a concentrated piece that seemed to enshrine Jewish music and character in its short but broad frame. And still the music came pouring out, with sparkling pyrotechnics in Rostropovich's Humoresque and, as a soulful encore, Rachmaninov's Vocalise. A breathtaking event.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article