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Live From Warsaw · The Piano Maven with Jed Distler

• 0:07
  This is Jed Disler, and welcome to The Piano
• 0:10
  Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano recordings.
• 0:16
  And I'm sure that you know that I have been on
• 0:19
  this long European tour. I was in London all
• 0:24
  of September 2025. I was playing concerts that
• 0:28
  were just so much fun. I was playing recitals.
• 0:32
  And I played the Shostakovich Seventh Symphony
• 0:35
  in a two -piano transcription with Christian
• 0:38
  Sandrin, who, by the way, has a fantastic recording
• 0:41
  of the Purcell Suites for keyboard and also the
• 0:46
  last three Beethoven sonatas. Definitely check
• 0:48
  those out. And then I was in Helsinki and in
• 0:53
  Espoo. in Finland where I played the Mahler Ninth
• 0:57
  Symphony on two pianos with Risto Matimodin who
• 1:01
  is such a phenomenal pianist and collaborating
• 1:05
  with him was like Driving a Rolls Royce, basically.
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  He did all the work, and I just kind of coasted
• 1:12
  along. No, seriously, it was a very rewarding
• 1:15
  collaboration. And I taught master classes. And
• 1:18
  all of this sort of primed me for arriving in
• 1:23
  Warsaw on September 30th. And I am still in Warsaw.
• 1:29
  I have been blogging about the 19th Chopin Competition,
• 1:35
  the 19th. international Chopin competition. I've
• 1:39
  been blogging for Gramophone magazine and also
• 1:42
  the Chopin Institute has been sponsoring a daily
• 1:46
  Chopin report which is published on YouTube so
• 1:51
  I guess I'm a video blogger or a video vlogger
• 1:55
  and some people have asked me if I could make
• 1:59
  the Piano Maven into a video podcast. And I've
• 2:03
  resisted that for a long time, mainly because
• 2:06
  I really don't want to compete with my friend
• 2:08
  David Hurwitz, who has the ultimate classical
• 2:13
  music guide with thousands and thousands and
• 2:16
  thousands of them and his overflow room and his
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  big collection of tam -tams and also his two
• 2:23
  wonderful cats. I mean, I cannot compete with
• 2:26
  that. Well, I have two cats at home. And if you
• 2:30
  have seen the segments that I've done for Ben
• 2:33
  Laude's Chopin podcast, which is... an absolutely
• 2:38
  wonderful podcast, and it's such a treasure trove
• 2:41
  of information. When I've made my recording recommendations,
• 2:45
  you often see my cat Shuby walking across the
• 2:49
  desk or walking on the piano. He always likes
• 2:52
  to get into the act. And Shuby is a male cat,
• 2:56
  a red tabby, and David Hurwitz has two female
• 3:00
  red tabbies. So we don't want Shuby competing
• 3:04
  with Finster and Mildred, of course. But maybe
• 3:07
  it is a good idea to make the transition from
• 3:09
  audio to video. I would like your feedback on
• 3:13
  this. I personally find video a little bit distracting
• 3:16
  when I want to get news or information or hear
• 3:19
  conversations or interviews because I... Just
• 3:23
  like to hear the words and just leave the visuals
• 3:26
  to my imagination. But I guess I'm old school
• 3:29
  in that way. But at least I know how to use a
• 3:32
  computer and I know how to do audio editing,
• 3:35
  which I do for my podcasts. Because if I didn't
• 3:38
  edit, I would sound like a klutz. Anyway, if
• 3:42
  you are a Chopin lover... and a piano maven.
• 3:46
  You probably know that you've been able to watch
• 3:50
  the Chopin competition in real time on the Chopin
• 3:55
  Institute's YouTube channel, and you also have
• 3:58
  been able to catch up on all of the rounds anytime
• 4:01
  that you want to see them. So we are in the middle
• 4:04
  of the semifinals now, and... I will direct you
• 4:08
  to the links to my Daily Chopin Report, where
• 4:12
  you can hear and see my detailed commentary on
• 4:16
  the performances. But I thought that for this
• 4:19
  audio podcast edition of the Piano Maven on October
• 4:24
  16th, that... Maybe I could just step back and
• 4:29
  reflect upon some performances from stages one
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  and two that really spoke to me, many of which
• 4:37
  feature pianists who did not advance into either
• 4:42
  stage two or the stage three semifinals. I've
• 4:45
  chosen five performances to talk about today,
• 4:48
  and I've provided YouTube links in my episode
• 4:52
  description so you can check these out for yourself.
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  From the moment she put her hands on the keyboard
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  in stage one, I fell in love with the depth of
• 5:04
  sound and the intense concentration that the
• 5:07
  18 -year -old Yan Yan Boa brought to... almost
• 5:12
  everything that she played, I have to admit it
• 5:14
  took me a little bit of time to get into her
• 5:17
  first selection because she started playing the
• 5:20
  Op. 27 No. 2 Nocturne very slowly. And at first
• 5:26
  I thought, oh my God, is this the Muzak version
• 5:30
  of it? This is making Yundi Lee sound like, oh,
• 5:35
  I don't know, a speed demon or something. But
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  soon I was totally drawn into her sound world.
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  It's a very serious and meticulous sound world
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  with a tinge of melancholy, perhaps. But I was
• 5:51
  completely sold on her masterful rendition of
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  the fourth ballade. Apparently, she was running
• 5:58
  a fever throughout her round, so her playing
• 6:02
  is all the more impressive. And I'm very sorry
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  that she was not advanced into stage three. But
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  we do have this gorgeous performance, so you
• 6:12
  can check out the link. The second performance
• 6:14
  I want to talk about that really moved me was
• 6:17
  from the Spanish pianist Pedro Lopez. solace.
• 6:20
  He did not make it past stage one, sad to say,
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  and he's a pianist after my own heart, but his
• 6:28
  eloquent treatment of the intricate polyphonic
• 6:32
  layers throughout Chopin's E major nocturne,
• 6:36
  opus 62 number two, I think deserved its own
• 6:40
  gold medal, and I think you'll hear that for
• 6:42
  yourselves. My third recommendation features
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  the Canadian pianist Kevin Chan, who not surprisingly
• 6:50
  has gotten into the third round. He is a super
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  transcendental virtuoso of the first order and
• 7:00
  has total control over his instrument. A subscriber
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  who I've been corresponding with had been sending
• 7:08
  me many, many links of performances, some which
• 7:12
  I auditioned, some of them I frankly did not
• 7:15
  look at. I didn't do my homework. Oh, bad, bad,
• 7:20
  bad, bad shit. No, but seriously, I checked out
• 7:24
  some of these Kevin Chen videos and... As impressed
• 7:27
  as I was, it's not the same thing as seeing him
• 7:31
  live. It's a whole different ballgame. And speaking
• 7:36
  of ballgame, he hit a home run in almost every
• 7:40
  Chopin etude he played in the Opus 10 group.
• 7:44
  I have rarely heard such vividly detailed renditions
• 7:48
  of... Numbers one and two and four and five,
• 7:54
  the black key etude, and number seven, that double
• 7:57
  note etude that Ignaz Friedman made famous, and
• 8:00
  also number eight. And, you know, he takes such
• 8:04
  inhuman speeds. And I do often feel that he plays
• 8:09
  too fast for what the music says. But simply
• 8:13
  as piano playing per se, this... was quite the
• 8:19
  tour de force, and I provided a link. And, you
• 8:22
  know, it reminds me of that joke, why do dogs
• 8:25
  lick? Well, I'm not going to go there, but the
• 8:29
  punchline is because they can. You know what
• 8:31
  that joke is. My fourth recommendation. I was
• 8:37
  blown away by the Japanese pianist Shiori Kuohara,
• 8:41
  especially... In this proudly robust and red
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  -blooded performance that she gave of the heroic
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  A -flat Polonaise, Op. 53, when she played, the
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  music seemed to fill the room. And my goodness,
• 8:58
  what nobility of character. And her interpretation
• 9:02
  really defined authenticity and generosity, which
• 9:07
  are qualities that I did not really hear in...
• 9:11
  some of the pianists in Warsaw. And this was
• 9:14
  a perfect example of pianistic mastery at the
• 9:19
  beck and call of the music. And the word stirring
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  probably sums it all up. And check out the YouTube
• 9:28
  link. I am sure you will agree. And last but
• 9:33
  not least, hearing William Young play the Andante
• 9:38
  Spinato in Grand Polonaise. was like viewing
• 9:42
  a painting by an old master that has been cleaned
• 9:46
  and restored to its original glory. The sheer
• 9:51
  lightness and transparency and the sense of direction
• 9:56
  and the sense of scintillation without flippancy
• 10:00
  that characterized this performance, I think
• 10:04
  sets reference standards. I have to be honest,
• 10:08
  nothing that I had heard in his stage one performance,
• 10:12
  nor in his performances earlier this year in
• 10:16
  Miami, prepared me for the really remarkable
• 10:20
  playing that he gave in stage two. And it's rather
• 10:26
  rash of me to make a prediction at this point,
• 10:29
  but if William Young's freshly considered Chopin
• 10:35
  interpretations without any received opinion
• 10:38
  whatsoever wind up pointing to new interpretive
• 10:43
  possibilities in this repertoire that will influence
• 10:47
  other pianists, I won't be a bit surprised. So
• 10:52
  these are just five of the many distinctive performances
• 10:55
  that I've been hearing live in Warsaw these past
• 10:59
  weeks during the 19th International Chopin Competition.
• 11:04
  I am sure that you have been making your own
• 11:06
  discoveries throughout the competition, and I
• 11:09
  invite you to share these choices with me and
• 11:12
  with your fellow piano mavens. I always welcome
• 11:16
  your comments and your feedback, only as long
• 11:20
  as we keep things civil, because if you don't
• 11:22
  keep things civil, I'm going to delete you. Seriously,
• 11:27
  though, thank you for listening, and this is
• 11:30
  Jed Disler. You've been listening to... The Piano
• 11:34
  Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano recordings
• 11:38
  and piano videos from the Chopin Competition.
• 11:42
  Until next time, take good care, and I look forward
• 11:46
  to being with you for our next episode.