Review: Peter Donohoe at the Adrian Boult Hall

Jul 30 2010 By Norman Stinchcombe

There is nothing effete about Chopin’s Four Ballades and they suited Donohoe’s sinewy unsentimental approach.

The first, in G minor, starts deceptively in the crepuscular manner of a Chopin nocturne but soon erupts into a burst of heroic energy. The last is built on one of Chopin’s most beautiful melodies and Donohoe was a sure guide through its subtle transformations. The Andante Spianato and Grand Polonaise opened meditatively and finished in scintillating extroversion. Donohoe made Schumann’s youthful Toccata a bundle of perpetuum mobile energy while the initially bland melody of the Arabesque was magically transformed in its closing bars.

All this was eclipsed by Donohoe’s performance of the first book of Liszt’s Years of Pilgrimage, devoted to his travels in Switzerland. Donohoe’s performance again revealed his affinity for Liszt’s music. He brought these tone poems for piano vividly to life. From the opening sombre reminiscence of the hero William Tell to the quietly tolling bells of Geneva’s churches, the listener became a fellow traveller on Liszt’s journey. Donohoe eloquently revealed the shimmering mountain streams, shepherd’s songs, louring mountain crags, the bagpipe drone of a rustic dance, and unleashed a tremendous mountain storm with a truly thunderous series of octave runs.

Rating: 5/5