AIRBORNE ARTISTRY
Pianist Daniil Trifonov carries the London Symphony Orchestra into exuberant overdrive, Michael Church finds
The Barbican is building a series of concerts round the young Russian pianist Daniil Trifonov, and his talent deserves the accolade. For his first outing, he chooses to play Ravel’s sparkling G major piano concerto, and spins a fine haze of notes in the introduction before settling into the jazz-inflected Gershwin-esque main theme with laid-back authority. The first movement is airborne, the harp providing a golden dusting of sound to complement the piano’s clouds of trills, and the LSO supports the effects with violin glissandi and wood-wind wah-wahs.
I’ve always had a problem with the adagio of this work. Some critics find classical serenity in its ruminative trajectory, but I just sense hard slog: Ravel apparently struggled with it one bar at a time, and that’s how it comes over. A wayward and not particularly pleasing product of the intellect, rather than an effusion of instinct. Trifonov maintains a seraphic smile throughout, however, so he at least is a believer. As the live-