29 March: Matthew Trusler at 1901 Arts Club

Three days in a row, lucky me!  Today I dragged Erika to come with me again.  I’m sure she was completely exhausted; she just had her violin lesson (well over one hour) – Sorry Erika, but I truly enjoy your company.  We met up with Eldred, my father-in-law, at the venue.

1901 Arts Club is the place Lionel and I first met Alexei Grynyuk.  It is a cozy, friendly and intimate venue right by Waterloo station.  I like this place very much; the only slight problem is that you can hear all sorts of street noises.  This, however, disappears once the performance starts.

Matthew Trusler is a fabulous violinist.  The pianist was Gordon Back and the two of them performed Debussy’s Sonata No. 3, Prokofiev’s Sonata No. 1 and Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess Suite selection.  Evening concerts at the Club are part of a “Rush-Hour Recital Series” so they are slightly shorter than a full programme, and played without interval.

Prior to playing Prokofiev’s Sonata, Matthew explained this massive work, saying it was an unusually dark composition compared to the composer’s other  works.  Being an eternal optimist, Prokofiev composed Peter and Wolf and Romeo and Juliet while Shostakovich was writing screaming symphonies.  This violin Sonata was indeed so dark – lamenting over people who had died.  In fact it reminded a bit of Shostakovich’s Trio in E minor, which is also desperately dark.  Powerful and fiery are the words I would use to describe Matthew’s playing.  His bow kept snapping!  Penetrating deep sounds made me think that if I listened to him in a concert hall with better acoustics it would be ecstatic.  He was not just powerful though – he could be touching and sensitive too.  Towards the end there was a part which Matthew called ‘wind whistling over graves of the dead’.  It sounded just like that – a bit creepy, but it certainly had a feel of wind crawling over the grave and whirling up dust.  This part reminded me of the final movement of Chopin’s piano Sonata No. 2, which is named “wind howling around the gravestones”.  It was amazing to watch how Matthew’s bow barely touches the strings but glides smoothly over them.   And such fine, slight and sensitive sounds created by that.

Erika wanted to sit right in front, so we did, and though I had a very good view of the violinist I could not see the pianist very well unfortunately.  Erika was delighted to observe Matthew’s shifting technique as it was exactly what she was learning in her lesson prior to this concert!

After the concert we had a chance to meet the artists.  Both Matthew and Gordon are very busy performing all over the world; I hope I will have a chance to listen to them again.