Craig Sheppard, pianist, in Liszt recital; Meany Theater
By Melinda Bargreen
The 200th birthday of Franz Liszt, that rock star of the 19th-century keyboard, has just passed (he was born Oct. 22, 1811 and died 75 eventful and occasionally scandalous years later). The Liszt bicentennial has not gone unnoticed; here in Seattle, the University of Washington faculty pianist Craig Sheppard presented a phenomenal all-Liszt recital on the eve of the composer’s birthday.
Like Sheppard’s other Meany Theater concerts in the past several years, this one was recorded live for Romeo Records, so those who missed the recent concert will still have a chance to hear him play some of the most challenging repertoire ever composed for keyboard: Books I and II of Liszt’s “Les Années de Pèlerinage” (The Years of Pilgrimage). The substantial succession of 16 separate pieces (nine of them in Book I, “Suisse” or Switzerland, and seven in Book II, “Italie”) presents vignettes of lakes, valleys, atmospheres, recollections, and readings from Liszt’s travels abroad with his mistress Marie, Comtesse d’Agoult. (Marie bore Liszt three illegitimate children, one of whom grew up to marry the composer Richard Wagner in equally scandalous circumstances.)
The “Années de Pèlerinage” contain such huge, difficult pieces that they usually make their way only singly onto recital programs, usually as the grand finale to an evening that has perhaps started with some decorous Mozart and gone on to some Chopin or Schumann. Hearing 16 enormous Liszt works back-to-back is an experience audiences almost never get, because few pianists have the energy, the technique, and the focus to present an evening like that.
Sheppard is legendary for all three of those attributes. This is the thinking man’s Liszt player, but he’s also long on sheer drama. His playing etched every detail with razor-sharp intensity, rising to the grandiose statements of “La Chapelle de Guillaume Tell” and relaxing into the cascading delicacy of “Au bord d’une source.” “Les Cloches de Genève” emerged with an almost lambent warmth.
Even better known were several of the works from Book II, particularly the three “Petrarch Sonnets” and the grand finale, “Après une Lecture de Dante” (usually called the “Dante Sonata”) – which got an absolutely cataclysmic performance. Sheppard attacked the work with hair-raising firepower, his huge technique covering the keyboard with thundering octaves and also a delicate filigree of overlaid chords. The audience erupted into cheers, but even an ovation did not bring on an encore: how could you possibly follow up a performance like this one? Anything else would be anticlimactic.
The lengthy and informative program notes bear witness not only to Sheppard’s depth of personal study of Liszt, but also to his professorial skills: He’s a born explainer. Readers of these notes may well feel they’ve just passed “Liszt 101.”
Sheppard pays further homage to Liszt on Jan. 26, when he performs the composer’s Piano Concerto No. 2 with the University of Washington Symphony under the direction of Jonathan Pasternack.
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