Word: berman
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...Readers were launched, and where Red Blaik and Ara Parseghian got their starts in football. After last week it may also be remembered as the site of the U.S. debut of the latest in a long line of Russian pianists that includes Emil Gilels and Sviatoslav Richter. Lazar Berman, 45, is unknown in the U.S. and Western Europe. But collectors of Soviet recordings, as well as many pianists throughout the world, have for years praised his talent...
...Berman is a virtuoso whose blinding technique appears an easy rival to that of Vladimir Horowitz. Yet Berman's is a humble kind of virtuosity that is not afraid of understatement. His debut, the start of a 15-concert tour of nine states, occurred in a walled-off end of Millett Hall, the Miami U. sports arena-which had surprisingly good acoustics. A burly bear with stooped shoulders, ginger-colored beard and long brown hair that waves up at the neck, Berman came out looking grim and tense. Once he was at the keyboard, all illusions of nerves...
...Although Berman has not played enough for fair comparison with Gilels and Richter, one wonders if either could present a better recital...
...program designed to get the question of Berman's technique out of the way at once. The Liszt Sonata in B minor offers a hard challenge to any pianist's claims on a big romantic style...
...Berman used the sonata to exhibit the fleetest of fingers and an extraordinary range of sound-from thundering climaxes to whispering pianissimos. Liszt's Spanish Rhapsody is entirely a display piece; Berman's epic double-octave runs near the end were breathtaking. The choice of Beethoven's crisp, bouncy Sonata No. 18, Op. 31, No. 3, rather than one of the composer's mightier scores, was wise: one does not spout deep philosophy at a fireworks display. Berman's playing of the sonata was immaculate, and not without humor...