thoughtcrumbs

Louis Lortie plays the Rach 3

Canadian pianist Louis Lortie is playing Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 with the Oregon Symphony this weekend. Not for the petite-handed, this profoundly challenging piece received some attention in the movie Shine for its haunting complexity and big fat chords. And, perhaps, for driving David Helfgott crazy. Last night Lortie appeared to play the forty-minute opus effortlessly (and sanely), his back arched, face presented to the heavens, and hands gliding autonomously across the keys. Bohuslav Martin?'s serene "Memorial to Lidice" also held last night's audience rapt, its tranquil beauty belying its grave subject matter: the slaughter of the male population of a Czechoslovakian town by Nazis in 1943. And Nielsen's Symphony No. 5 features an arrhythmic snare drum solo, an uncomfortable WWI salvo in which the percussionist even acted the part of a steadfast gunner, resolutely firing round after round. Overall, a gorgeous combination of affecting pieces.