Jason Chiu’s “Romantically Charged” Recital

Jason Chiu in an earlier recital performance (courtesy of Old First Concerts)

Yesterday afternoon Old First Concerts presented the first of this month’s eight programs performed in and live-streamed from Old First Presbyterian Church. The series began with a solo piano recital by Jason Chiu described as a “romantically charged” program. The “core” of this program involved relatively short selections by three nineteenth-century female composers. The first of these was a nocturne in B-flat major by Maria Szymanowska, one of the first professional virtuoso pianists of that century. This was followed by the first of the four pieces in Fanny Mendelssohn’s Opus 8 Songs Without Words. The “set” then concluded with Cécile Chaminade’s Opus 153, entitled “Caprice-Impromptu.”

Each of these pieces could be taken as a “salon” selection, although the Mendelssohn composition was not published until after her death. However, this “core” was flanked on either side by selections that reflected, rather than embodied, the romantic spirit and were created for the concert hall, rather than the salon. Thus, the program began with Ferruccio Busoni’s reworking of the Chaconne movement from Johann Sebastian Bach’s D minor solo violin partita (BWV 1004), transforming it into a flamboyant display of keyboard virtuosity. That selection was “paired” at the conclusion with another major finger-busting undertaking, Ludwig van Beethoven’s Opus 57 (“Appassionata”) sonata in F minor. This “early emergence” of romanticism was preceded by an “afterthought” of that movement, represented by Maurice Ravel’s “Jeux d’eau.”

This made for an imaginative perspective on the emergence, progress, and decline of the romantic aesthetic. Chiu established that perspective through his overall program plan, and each composition was executed in a manner that confirmed its contribution to that program. One might say that Chiu had prepared a thoroughly engaging performance, whose engagement was established on an imaginative historical perspective. In other words this was a program that appealed to both “head and heart” in equal measure, leaving me curious about how Chiu has planned (or will plan) his other recital programs.