Alexander Malofeev, Piano

Tuesday, March 19, 2024 7:30 PM Zankel Hall

Alexander Malofeev

A major rising star on the international music scene, pianist Alexander Malofeev has received adoring reviews for his recent debuts throughout the United States. Malofeev won the prestigious International Tchaikovsky Competition for Young Musicians when he was only 13 years old, and now, the sky appears to be the limit. In a recital that includes works by virtuoso Russian pianist-composers Scriabin, Medtner, and Rachmaninoff, as well as a J. S. Bach organ concerto reworked from Vivaldi, he will combine virtuosity with “probing interpretative depths” and “a rare poetic grace” (Boston Classical Review).

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Performers

Alexander Malofeev, Piano

Program

J. S. BACH Concerto in A Minor, BWV 593 (transcr. Feinberg; after Vivaldi)

SCRIABIN Prelude and Nocturne for the Left Hand, Op. 9

SCRIABIN Two Impromptus, Op. 12

MEDTNER Sonata-Reminiscenza in A Minor, Op. 38, No. 1

RACHMANINOFF Prelude in C-sharp Minor from Morceaux de fantaisie, Op. 3, No. 2

RACHMANINOFF Elégie in E-flat Minor from Morceaux de fantaisie, Op. 3, No. 1

RACHMANINOFF Etude-tableau in E-flat Minor, Op. 33, No. 5

RACHMANINOFF Etude-tableau in G Minor, Op. 33, No. 7

RACHMANINOFF Etude-tableau in C-sharp Minor, Op. 33, No. 6

RACHMANINOFF "Lilacs," Op. 21, No. 5

RACHMANINOFF Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-flat Minor, Op. 36

Encores:

HANDEL Minuet from Suite in B-flat Major, HWV 434

TCHAIKOVSKY "Pas de deux" from The Nutcracker (arr. Mikhail Pletnev)

MEDTNER "Canzona serenata" from Forgotten Melodies I, Op. 38 No. 6

Event Duration

The printed program will last approximately two hours, including one 20-minute intermission.

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At a Glance

All four composer-pianists featured on tonight’s program were closely identified with the Russian piano school of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Russia had been a musical powerhouse ever since the 1860s, when the virtuoso pianists Anton Rubinstein and his brother Nikolai founded conservatories in St. Petersburg and Moscow, respectively. At the Moscow Conservatory, Alexander Scriabin and Sergei Rachmaninoff honed their technique as fellow pupils of the notorious martinet Nikolai Zverev. Scriabin went on to study under Vasily Safonov, an equally demanding pedagogue who counted the slightly younger Nicolas Medtner among his protégés. All three men graduated with gold medals and went on to have major international careers as both composers and pianists.

The triumvirate was united by close personal ties as well: Rachmaninoff and Scriabin lived together under Zverev’s roof for several years, and Rachmaninoff would be Medtner’s chief patron in their joint exile from Soviet Russia. Although Samuil Feinberg belonged to a younger generation—he graduated from the Moscow Conservatory in 1911 and remained in the Soviet Union until his death—he, too, claimed membership in the Russian School. Scriabin sang his praise as an interpreter of his tightly concentrated Sonata No. 4. Feinberg’s performances of Bach’s keyboard music—including the Bach-Vivaldi concerto that opens our concert—were highly praised, and he was the first Russian pianist to play the entire Well-Tempered Clavier in public.

Bios