I was delighted to have the opportunity to attend some of the events and concerts at the inaugural London Piano Festival, conceived and directed by pianists Katya Apekisheva and Charles Owen. For the opening edition of the festival, the directors invited artists who they admired and worked with personally. As Charles and Katya stated in the Festival programme:
“Pianists meet each other far too rarely in the real world, mostly at auditions and competitions when we take our first steps in the music profession, and then at each other’s concerts. The professional soloist’s life is, by its very nature, a demanding and often solitary one. [The festival] is especially designed to bring these soloists together…..”
And it was perhaps a mark of the organisers’ success in achieving this aim that so many eminent pianists and music lovers were in the audience for the concerts, including Stephen Hough and Alexandra Dariescu, amongst others.
The festival was held in the stylish, contemporary concert spaces at London’s Kings Place, fast becoming a popular hub for culture and arts in the newly-redeveloped area around King’s Cross station. The sense of “music by friends and for friends” was very clear from the warm atmosphere in and out of the concert halls, and the two-piano gala concert on Saturday evening, which was at the heart of the festival, was a wonderful celebration of musical friendship and collaboration. I attended two concerts with pianist friends, always enjoyable as we discussed what we had heard during the intervals and after the events. As one of my pianist friends remarked when I met her for the two-piano gala concert, “I feel completely intoxicated by music!”. I can think of no better endorsement for this wonderful weekend of piano music.
My reviews are on the Bachtrack.com site – follow the links below to read them:
A feast of phenomenal pianism: two-piano gala concert
The Cross-Eyed Pianist 