Leon Fleisher Press Clips: April 17, 2009

Sunday, April 5, 2009 http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/ae/s_618965.html

CD reviews: Fleisher's Mozart disc shows singular insights MOZART: PIANO CONCERTI 23, 12, 7 Leon Fleisher, piano and conductor, Katherine Jacobson Fleisher, piano, Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra (Sony Classical) Rejoice music lovers, for Sony Classical has released a new recording of Leon Fleisher performing three piano concerti by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The CD was made just before Fleisher's 80th birthday in July 2008 and shows his ability to project his singular insights is undimmed. His career was interrupted in 1965 when focal distonia cost him the use of his right hand, but Botox injections permit him to play two-hand repertoire once again. All three Mozart pieces are new to Fleisher's discography, most importantly, the sublime Piano Concerto No. 23 in A major. As conductor, Fleisher leads the orchestra with uncommonly thorough insight, creating a seamless continuity with his own playing. This pianist became legendary at a very early age for his combination of sensitivity, warmth, intellectual power and virtuosity. Fleisher also brings the less familiar Piano Concerto No. 12, also in A major, to life with enlivening nuances that make its neglect seem an injustice. So too, the Piano Concerto No. 7 performed with his wife, Katherine Jacobson Fleisher, has remarkable dimension. After hearing this disc, you'll be looking for excuses to make it a gift for friends. — Mark Kanny

April 16, 2009

RECORDINGS: Classical and traditional music are featured on CDs By FRANK BEHRENS Contributing Writer

Those who follow the careers of great keyboard players will be most interested in a Sony Classical CD of Leon Fleisher performing Mozart’s Piano Concerti 12 and 23 along with No. 7 in the composer’s own arrangement for two pianos. This disc has special interest because it is Fleisher’s first two-hand recording in over 40 years! (He suffered from focal dystonia in his right hand.) It remains for the listener to judge his recovery on the basis of this recording, and I would appreciate hearing the opinions of some of my readers. His wife joins him in the No. 7 performance and they are accompanied by the Stuttgarter Kammerorchester, conducted by Leon himself. Sony Classical has issued a lovely CD featuring guitarist Sharon Isbin, “Journey to the New World.” The title comes from the concept of her family’s journey from Ireland to the early American colonies and then to the West Coast in the early 1900s. As she explains in the program notes, “(T)he individual folk tunes are in a chronological form that mirrors both the evolution of American folk music and the course of my family’s migration.” Among the 29 tracks on this disc, two of them have Joan Baez supplying the vocal, while violinist Mark O’Connor accompanies Isbin in his “Strings & Threads Suite.” All in all, this is a most impressive concert of folk music arrangements. For youngsters only. After the immense popularity of the two “Ghostbuster” films, an animated series was made for television (unseen by me) titled “The Real Ghostbusters.” A press release tells me that the sale of the complete series on Time-Life DVDs (147 episodes, mind you) met with good critical acclaim. So Time-Life is following up with “a more cost effective option.” It is called “The Real Ghostbusters, Volume 1” and holds the first 30 episodes on 5 DVDs—plus a “making of” bonus and a ROM element with scripts and story boards. Strictly, again, for the younger viewers, most of whom should love this set. Note: This is my 200th report for Keene Sentinel. I hope I have been serving my readers well.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/music/chi-0402-classical-jvrapr02,0,1150048.story April 2, 2009

Leon Fleisher's passion for piano not diminished by neurological condition John von Rhein Heard and Scene Since regaining the use of his right hand after a neurological condition truncated his brilliant career for 30 years, pianist Leon Fleisher has been living one of the great comebacks in classical music. With a busy performing and teaching schedule that belies his 80 years, he plays a select number of concerts, picking and choosing the repertory that feels comfortable at this stage of his life. "Sometimes I can't tell whether it's because of the [focal] dystonia or the normal aging process that I can't play the Rachmaninov Third or Tchaikovsky concertos," he recently said. "Actually I'm quite grateful I can no longer play them!" One composer whose music continues to flow gracefully from his 10 fully functioning fingers is Mozart. Sony has just released a Fleisher album containing three Mozart concertos, including No. 12 in A Major (K.414) that marked his return to two-handed piano playing in 1995; the musicmaking is a marvel. Fortunately Fleisher still can play J.S. Bach beautifully, too, as an all-Bach recital he gave Tuesday at the University of Chicago proved. His technique may be less reliable than before, but there were enough flashes of the old Fleisher to suggest his magisterial musical vision remains unimpaired. The Botox injections he takes every four months alleviate some of the symptoms of his dystonia but have not eliminated the condition, Fleisher says. So one of the great American pianists soldiers on, taking special pleasure in passing along his musical wisdom to students at Baltimore's Peabody Conservatory, where he has taught since 1959. A Ravinia mainstay, Fleisher will return to the festival to lead a master class on June 30 and perform chamber music with violinist Miriam Fried and cellist Frans Helmerson July 2. "Surprisingly enough, despite all the sadness and depression that came with my dystonia," Fleisher reflects, "I'm not sure that if I had the chance again that I would change a thing." CSO noteThe Chicago Symphony Orchestra has hired Lora Schaefer, principal oboe of the Kansas City Symphony, for the position of second oboe. She will be sitting in with the CSO wind section in late April and early May before officially joining the orchestra July 6 at Ravinia. CD of the weekJohn Corigliano: "A Dylan Thomas Trilogy." Nashville Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, Leonard Slatkin conducting (Naxos). Corigliano's "memory play in the form of an oratorio" incorporates Dylan Thomas settings for baritone, tenor, boy soprano, chorus and orchestra he composed between 1960 and 1975. In its revised version, completed in 1999, the cycle represents the three ages of man, framed by a prologue and intermezzo in which the poet, portrayed here with operatic gusto by baritone Thomas Allen, rails against his mortality in a fit of midlife madness. Out of disparate materials Corigliano has fashioned a coherent and deeply moving autobiographical mosaic that celebrates the wild exultation of Thomas' poetry through music at once rueful, honeyed and evocative. Both the performance and recording are first rate.

One of the three concertos on the new disc, called "Mozart Piano Concertos" and available in the United States on the Sony Classical label on March 31, is the same one Fleisher performed in 1995 which marked his return to two-handed playing. "IRRECONCILABLE PEDDLING" The pianist plays with the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra and performs Mozart's piano concertos No. 23, No. 12 and No. 7. The latter is for two pianos and he is joined by his wife Katherine Jacobson-Fleisher. Asked if playing and recording with his wife led to tensions in the relationship, Fleisher replied: "My wife and I are quite proud of saying we have invented a new tort law for divorce. The big challenge for four-hand piano is only one person can peddle. We have invented new tort law which is divorce due to irreconcilable peddling." Despite the deep depression he suffered when forced to "retire" at 37, Fleisher said the experience brought rewards. "There are moments in my life when I think back on this whole soap opera (and) I am not so sure, if I had the chance, that I would change anything," he said. "It forced me to expand my horizons. I discovered I had a pretty bad two years of depression after it struck back in the mid-60s. "Suddenly one morning I woke up and decided my connection to music was more than just as a two-handed piano player. There were other ways I could remain connected and active in music." Fleisher believes his story, well known in classical music circles and the subject of an Oscar-nominated documentary, will give "hope and courage to those who are confronted with events in their lives that seemed to be insuperable." Asked about his future plans, he answered: "I have all kinds of performance plans, playing, conducting and recording. My main concern is that I wake up tomorrow morning."

March 22, 2009

http://blog.al.com/mhuebner/2009/03/leon_fleisher_cds_offer_glimps.html

Leon Fleisher CDs offer glimpse of early glory Posted by Michael Huebner -- Birmingham News Leon Fleisher's career can be parsed roughly into three periods. Before the pianist, then 36, was stricken with focal dystonia in his right hand during the 1964-65 season, he was on top of the classical music world. Definitive readings of Brahms piano concertos with George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra were among the string of recordings -including Beethoven, Rachmaninoff, Schumann and Grieg -- yielded from that stellar combination.

Leon Fleisher The ensuing decades of left-hand-only piano music, conducting, teaching and painful therapy led to an important milestone. In 1995, he returned to two-hand performance, performing again with the Cleveland Orchestra. Solo CDs followed -- "Two Hands" in 2004 and "The Journey" in 2006. Two more follow this year. A six-CD set of recordings from 1958 to 1963, available from www.arkivmusic.com, has been remastered and released on Sony. When Fleisher comes to Birmingham this week, he will give listeners the chance to compare the young upstart pianist with a musician who, at age 80, seems to have unlimited destinations. Next Sunday, after soloing in Ravel's Concerto for the Left Hand Friday and Saturday with the Alabama Symphony, he will play a solo recital in which three works from those early recordings are programmed. LEON FLEISHER Six-CD set Sony 4 stars out of 5

Schubert. From 1954 comes a 36-year-old Fleisher playing Schubert's B flat major Sonata, D. 960, with unforced beauty and almost religious devotion, from the undulating, ambient bass notes of the opening movement, through the intricate dramas unfolding in the Scherzo and finale. Eight short pieces from Schubert's "Landler," Op. 171, could almost be danceable if not interrupted by Fleisher's rhythmic playfulness and arresting virtuosity. Fleisher will perform both of these works next Sunday.

Debussy, Ravel. Also on next Sunday's program is Ravel's "Valses Nobles et Sentimentales," which, in this 1958 recording, exudes ease and confidence. More noble than sentimental, it never succumbs to impressionistic haziness. Debussy's "Suite Bergamasque," with its famous "Claire de Lune" third movement, is played boldly and securely, bursts of joie de vivre mixed with pointillistic dryness.

Liszt, Weber. A recording from 1959 reveals Fleisher's overwhelming strength and stamina. Liszt's Sonata in B minor surges from a lyrical, endearing calm in the Andante to a wild, nearly demonic temperament in the finale. So unfettered is Fleisher's dynamic range in this album, the origins of his future physical maladies can easily be imagined. Mozart. Two piano sonatas are combined with the Rondo in D major in performances from 1958 and 1959. Although performed with metronomic regularity, Fleisher makes these pieces breathe with his architectural vision, swelling and ebbing dynamics and cascading arpeggios and scales. Copland, Sessions, Kirchner, Rorem. In 1962, Fleisher was providing living composers with performances of a lifetime. The recipients on this recording were a diverse group whose music ranged from pillars of dissonance to nostalgic tenderness. No composer is treated less worthily than any other, but Copland, in his more adventurous mode in the Piano Sonata, is given a particularly vibrant reading. More melancholy writing pervades Rorem's "Three Barcarolles," Fleisher performing them with haunting beauty.

Brahms. The Juilliard String Quartet could not have asked for a more communicative collaborator than Fleisher for Brahms' Piano Quintet in F minor, Op. 34, recorded in 1962. Impeccable ensemble, grace, drama and, most important, unanimity of musical vision, make this a treasured component of a historic set. The pitfalls of the set are obvious and expected. Half-century-old recording equipment and techniques put listeners in a what-if-this-was-digital mode, and occasional tape splices interrupt the flow. Get past that, and listen to Fleisher during his first heyday. Then hear him next weekend in his third.

Monday, March 30, 2009

Struggles don't deter from Leon Fleisher piano recital in Birmingham, Alabama MICHAEL HUEBNER News staff writer

Listening to a Leon Fleisher recital is like peering into his soul. Set aside the 80-year-old pianist's tragic illness that detoured his performing career for decades, and his triumphant return to two-handed performance in recent years. His solo recital Sunday, before a less than half-full Jemison Concert Hall, revealed a musician of thoughtful introspection and insight, as though each movement of each piece was a new revelation - not only for him, but for his listeners. Fleisher is not the same pianist who recorded the music on this recital in the 1950s. Because of his ongoing battle with focal hand dystonia, he has difficulty rattling off muscular octave patterns and intricate scales with crystalline accuracy. He clearly struggled in that regard in Brahms' Waltzes, Op. 39. What he has gained in a half century is an unflagging sense of rhythmic urgency and the ability to convey musical structure through touch, silence and purity of sound. Repeated phrases in Schubert's "Landler," D. 790, and that composer's Sonata in B flat major, D. 960 weren't mere repeats or echos, but subtle mood shifts, each brimming with discovery. In "Valses nobles et sentimentales," Fleisher capitalized on Ravel's witty rhythmic play with suave connections between the eight waltzes, fashioning a wide impressionistic canvas of gentle pastels. Most revealing were the inner melodies, often overlooked in performances of this work, that phased in and out of focus. Wrong notes or not, this reading topped dozens of others I've heard, including Fleisher's own 1958 recording. The opening movement of the Schubert sonata was shaped by profound pauses, an undulating bass and a melody that sang tenderly. The minor-key Andante played out like a poignant novella, complete with moments of major-key relief. By accepting his affliction, Fleisher appears to have transcended it. More important, he is using it to its best advantage - to genuinely inform each piece he plays with purpose and meaning. E-mail: [email protected]

http://ca.reuters.com/article/entertainmentNews/idCATRE52P3CI20090326?sp=true

Fleisher plays Mozart in two-hand concerto return Thu Mar 26, 2009 12:30pm EDT

By Mike Collett-White LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. pianist Leon Fleisher's right hand is one of the most famous in music. In the mid-1960s the superstar of the classical music world lost the ability to play with the hand when two fingers became immobile due to a condition called focal dystonia. After 30 years of teaching, conducting and playing music composed for the left hand, Fleisher regained the use of his right hand after treatment involving botox injections. The first recording since his rehabilitation came in 2004, and now the 80-year-old has released a recording of Mozart piano concertos including one where he performs with his wife. He said the choice of music was partly dictated by physical limitations. "I am still a dystonic, if you will," Fleisher said in a telephone interview from the United States. "I have focal dystonia and although I take treatments that help minimize the effects of it, nothing cures it, at least not yet, so I have to pick and choose my repertoire. "I'm not a spring chicken. I don't know what is the dystonia and what is the toll of years." He described Mozart as "the most transcendent and economical" of composers. "If we had to be paid by the note, we would be paupers if we played Mozart, in contrast to Rachmaninov. I love these pieces very much and they lay in the purview of my possibilities."