TWO BRILLIANT RUSSIAN MUSICIAN

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2864, 31 August 1916, Page 7

TWO BRILLIANT RUSSIAN MUSICIAN

THE MIROVITCH-PIASTRO CONCERTS. Messieurs Alfred Miroritch and Michael Piastre, two youug Russian musicians, who aro making a brief visit to New Zealand, met their first Wellington audience*in tho Concert Chamber of the Town Hall last evening. lions. Piastre is a violinist who, with many years of development still before him, has gained already remarkable technique and wonderful power ot' expression. His execution is easy,, deft, and sure; his tono ifc delightfully pure and &weet 4 and as occasion requires lie can make his instrument produce a wonderfully rich volume of sound or sing with a birdlike quality that is simply fascinating, like Lis companion, the violinist received his training in the Potrograd Conservatoire of Music, where his own countrymen had recogniscd his genius before lie was introduced to English-speaking audiences. He may owo his technique to a school that is recognised to bo among (ho best in Europe, and that has done a very great deal within recent years to provide expression for the musical genius of young Russia. Mons. Mirovilch, the pianist, is on first impression a musician of le;a brilliant parts than Mons. Piastre. But the impression does not persist. The work of tl;e pianist has depths probably not yet sounded by his younger compatriot. It .lacks scarcely anything on tho score of technique, and it has breadth, imagination, the quality most correctly described as soulfulness. Perhaps his best passages arc those giving him scope for the display of tho nuiet strength, swelling to" command, that is characteristic of his method, but ho showed last .light that he could make his instrument sing as well as declaim. Ho was as pleasing in the light, graceful movements of Wieniawslri's "Carnival Russe"—a lightness touched, like the Russian temperament, with gravity—as in the sonorous . opening passages of Chopin's "Sonata in C Plat Minor."

The programme for the first concert was an, attractive one, not over-weighted in tli© way that is tempting often to instrumentalists; but sufficiently varied to give Ml scope to each performer. Hons. Mirovitch and Piastre played together in the delightful opening number. Beethoven's "Sonata in a Major" ("Kreutzer Sonata"). Tljo pianist's solo numbers were the Chopin "Sonata," with the haunting melody of the 'Ufarche FuJiebre," the nocturne "Dream of love" (Liszt), and "Ehapsodie" No. 6 (Liszt). The violinist played Wieniawski's "Concerto, F. Sharp Minor" (first movement) and "Ave Maria." (Schubcrt-Wilhelmj). The audience was enthusiastic in its appreciation of the whole programme, and tho musicians responded generously to several encores. MOll3. Mirovitcli and Piast.ro will givo tiie' 6ecoi»l and last concert ■of their brief Wellington season to-niglifc, when they will present a> new programme.