A review of the concert on January 8, 2006 by Richard Scheinin.
Only 18 years old, pianist Natasha Paremski has a fat resume: performances with the San Francisco Symphony, the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra, as well as with her home-turf Symphony Silicon Valley. No wonder there was such anticipation among those who turned out Saturday to hear this young virtuoso — born in Moscow and raised in Fremont — in her first Bay Area recital.
This would be Paremski alone at the piano at San Jose’s Le Petit Trianon, performing pinnacle works of the piano repertory by Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy and Stravinsky. That she should even attempt such an ambitious and physically exhausting program is remarkable. That she should execute it with such control, stamina, and rhythmic and dynamic precision is a sign of her undeniable talent.
And yet, while it’s always exhilarating to see a young talent on the way up, this debut recital also made it clear that Paremski still is very much an unformed artist. She often seemed to be hovering at the music’s surface, not really knowing how to address the emotional mysteries of Beethoven’s “Tempest” Sonata, the lyricism and dread of Chopin’s Piano Sonata No. 2, or the state of suspension hidden inside the zillions of notes of Debussy’s _Estampes_.
One could argue that Paremski’s management and the Bay Area Steinway Society, which sponsored the recital, have unleashed the pianist too soon. Then again, a recital like this one, in front of a supportive local audience, is precisely the type of experience Paremski needs in order to discover who she is as an artist.
She already does a lot that’s right.
For instance, at the outset of Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 17 in D minor, known as the “Tempest,” she set just the right tone of foreboding. But the mood soon was lost, even as the pianist confidently executed the rapid, dramatic passage-work. The slow second movement seemed somewhat by rote, without introspection. The closing Allegretto, however, had terrific moments — a wild ride under a full moon — abetted by Paremski’s exceptional control of dynamic nuance.
This was a well thought-out recital; the Chopin begins with the same sort of propulsive motif that ends the Beethoven. Paremski excels at forte passages and rhythmic propulsion — if she drives, I bet she drives fast — and there were sparks as the Chopin got under way.
But again, the impossible tenderness in the second movement seemed beyond her reach. As for the famous Funeral March, the sound of death was largely missing; few 18-year-olds would find it. But then why play this piece? The Finale, once described by Anton Rubinstein as “night winds sweeping over churchyard graves,” took a wide turn around the cemetery.
By intermission, Paremski was leaving the impression of a player with phenomenal gifts who hasn’t yet learned to draw listeners into her world, because she hasn’t yet discovered it. It would have been nice, I thought, to hear her perform some Bach, or Brahms intermezzos; something to let her play with expressive simplicity, to help her cast out a line and find a voice.
Instead, the recital’s second half began with jazz pianist Fred Hersch’s _Three Character Studies_, which opens with an emphasis on contour, the movement of lines up and down, as the Chopin had ended. Paremski showed an affinity for the rhythms in the third movement, drawn from _chorinho_, the Brazilian cousin to tango and ragtime.
Then came Debussy’s _Estampes_. And while the young pianist didn’t unlock the door to that place of stasis beyond the work’s surface blur, her performance had an impressive way of building from stillness to chiming grandeur.
Cagily, she saved the best for last: Stravinsky’s _Petrouchka Suite_, one of the highest pinnacles in any recitalist’s repertory. The only Russian work on the Russian-born pianist’s program (which she repeated Sunday at Trianon), it sparkles, and Paremski lit right into it: bang!
There were some excessively clangorous moments, but just playing this piece is an achievement, and Paremski had it covered: the cross-handed fireworks, the memorable melodicism, the rhythmic drive. Moving into its final passages, her body was moving to the jaunty, bounding, accelerating rhythms.
There were three encores: Rachmaninoff’s “Elegy,” tepidly rendered, and then a pair of Chopin études, by the close of which Paremski seemed loose — ready to play, but out of time. The recital had ended.
Something tells me she’ll be back.
