2 Pianos - 40 Fingers - The Israel Camerata Jerusalem opens the 2021-2022 season with the MultiPiano Ensemble. Conductor: Roï Azoulay

Maestro Roi Azoulay (courtesy R. Azoulay)

          

The MultiPiano Ensemble (Michael Pavia)

Coming up to 20:30 on the evening of October 23rd 2021, the Recanati Auditorium of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art was an epicentre of curiosity in anticipation of "2 Pianos - 40 Fingers". Under the baton of Roï Azoulay, the Israel Camerata Jerusalem was about to host the MultiPiano Ensemble for the opening concert of the La Tempesta dei Solisti series. MultiPiano is a modular piano ensemble dedicated to performing works for keyboard ensembles, from one piano with four hands to several pianos in a variety of multi-hand combinations. Established in 2011 under the umbrella of the Buchmann–Mehta School of Music (Tel Aviv University) and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, this unique ensemble, attracting interest worldwide, features some of Israel’s finest young pianists together with their mentor, Prof. Tomer Lev.

Dating from the time W.A.Mozart moved to Vienna from Salzburg in order to further his reputation as a composer, performer and teacher, there exists an enigmatic incomplete manuscript titled "Larghetto and Allegro'' (c.1871). It was discovered in 1966 in a remote palace in Moravia. From the way the work is set out, it was most probably intended to be for two pianos, perhaps to be performed by the composer himself and his brilliant student Josepha von Auernhammer. Not the first to write a completion of this piece, Tomer Lev has taken it a step further: prompted by the work's key and communicative dialogue, he has added an orchestral dimension to it. With Lev and Nimrod Meiry-Haftel undertaking the piano parts, they were joined by Azoulay and the Camerata players for a performance alive with Mozart's signature sense of well-being, his operatic melodiousness, effervescence and debonair pianistic demands. Tomer Lev's streamlined, unambiguous score would put listeners hard to it to define where Mozart's writing trailed off and where it was taken up by Lev, the latter's buoyant orchestration including some lovely writing for woodwinds.

 

 A slightly earlier work, Mozart's Concerto for Two Pianos K.365 was written in Salzburg at a time when the composer chose to focus on the double concerto form, essentially replacing interplay between one solo player and orchestra with dialogue between the two soloists. This meant paring down orchestral forces both in texture and dominance. At the Tel Aviv concert, the piano roles were played by Tomer Lev and Berenika Glixman, whose concept, teamwork and clean enunciation countered one another in such a way that it was difficult to tell where one ended a gesture and the other took it up. Their playing gave expression to the work's joy, delight and moments of whimsy (punctuated by the occasional passing dark cloud) with the concerto's energetic and musical narrative emanating through its virtuosic lines. Azoulay maintained a solid orchestral sound throughout, pointing out Mozart's occasional tonal shifts and touches of dissonance, as in the Andante movement, which was so beautifully and plangently issued in by the oboe. The final movement (Rondo), both exuberant and bombastic, drew to a close with a brilliant cadenza, signing out with a brief, flamboyant orchestral flourish. To this day, Mozart's musical language remains universal!

Despite its high opus number, Frédéric Chopin's Rondo in C Major for Two Pianos, Op. posth.73 (1828) was written when he was a student at the Warsaw Conservatory. He initially conceived the piece as one for solo piano but later arranged it for two pianos. Not publishing either version in his lifetime, he was known to have referred to the radiant salon piece as “that orphan child.”  However, due to the work's solo-and-tutti connotations and concerto-like potential, Tomer Lev and composer Arie Levanon decided to make a setting of it for two pianos and orchestra. Lev and Glixman took on board the rhapsodic style, charming Romantic lyricism, harmonic flights and cascading figures of this veritable Konzertstück, welcoming back the light, sparkling, bravura-type rondo theme (of the kind that would have been popular with Romantic audiences) as it recurred between the otherwise flamboyant display of the two pianos and orchestra. Missing were only the glistening chandeliers, loges occupied by the aristocracy and the plush decor of European concert halls.

It was time for a breather from the pizzazz of the 19th century concert hall. Edvard Grieg's Suite in the Olden Style (Holberg Suite) could not have been more apt. This orchestral work was also a transcription: originally composed for piano, it was later turned into an orchestral suite by Grieg himself. It was composed to mark the 200th anniversary of playwright Ludvig Holberg's birth. Holberg was roughly a contemporary of J.S. Bach, prompting Grieg to use Baroque dance forms for the suite. From the sprightly Praeludium, to the noble Sarabande, the Gavotte, light-of-foot bookending a traditional Musette, to the stately cantabile Air, the suite is rounded off with two Rigaudons - one sparkling, one tranquil. Here was an opportunity to enjoy the high-quality performance of the Camerata's string section and Roï Azulay's reading of the work, which was finely detailed, articulate, contrasted and elegant. Raised in Dimona, Israel, international conductor, Grammy- and Juno award winner, Maestro Azoulay is known for his captivating interpretation of Classical-, Romantic- and contemporary music. 

In the autumn of 1824 pianist and composer Ignaz Moscheles was in Berlin. There, he became acquainted with the family of 15-year-old Felix Mendelssohn, eventually agreeing to take on young Felix as a piano student, "never forgetting for a moment that I was sitting next to a master and not a student", in Moscheles' own words. What transpired was a lifelong friendship. The Fantasie Brillante and Variations for two pianos and orchestra (1833), a joint composition of Mendelssohn and Moscheles, based on the Gypsy March from Weber's "Preziosa", began as an improvised concert piece. Its development and history have been quite a roller-coaster ride, with the manuscript finally found in 2009 in Anton Rubinstein's private archive in Russia. We heard Tomer Lev and Alon Kariv in the piano parts at the Tel Aviv concert. Following the grand entrance of the pianos, they gave expression to the piece's vivacity, to its emphasis on its pianistic brilliance, its geniality and moments of humour. Pianists and orchestra gave attention to the individual characters and style of each variation. 

An exhilarating concert and one brimming with interest! The Israel Camerata Jerusalem (music director: Avner Biron) is known for its enterprising programming. This was no exception and the audience took to it wholeheartedly!