Word: ohlsson
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...Many experimental musicians started with rock, before slowly abandoning it for the freedom and creative space that is experimental music," says Lao Yang, the owner of Sugar Jar, a tiny record shop in Beijing that serves as the epicenter of this burgeoning avant-garde. Michael Ohlsson, a Shanghai-based music promoter, speculates that musicians are being drawn to the experimental scene because the music being produced is a purist's form and often has no lyrics. As such, it is far less likely to offend officialdom than, say, punk, which tends to be much more verbose, socially engaged and populist...
...even the slightest pretense that the music being made by the avant-garde is commercially viable in its present form. The work is difficult at the best of times. But perhaps that is its point. "I guess the reason noise art is so poignant in China," says Ohlsson, "is that it's dramatically anticommercial in a place where everything is very commercial...
...Waltzes are basically failsafe for any equipped pianist, but one might have hoped for a bit more gusto from Ohlsson, whose suavity in these three miniatures was at times offputting. The Minute Waltz (at 1:53, mind you) sounded tossed-off, although with a hilarious ending, and the third of the set had nothing to recommend it. Only the ravishing C-sharp minor, trademark of Rachmaninoff and Rubinstein, demanded close listening. Ohlsson privileged the left hand at times when other pianists wouldn't, and sculpted a middle voice between the melodies...
...Ohlsson did well to close the programmed portion of his recital with the B-flat minor Scherzo. This playing was feverish, addictive, note-perfect and luscious at once. An especially fine cantabile reminiscent of a well-played B major nocturne (Op. 9 No. 3) and a successful barrage of blind leaps made for a triumphant exit...
...Celebrity Series artists are generous this year--Ohlsson gave four well-chosen encores, beginning with a sansculottes Revolutionary etude, and continuing with a glib. graceful Mazurka (Op. 30 No. 4), an ostentatiously fast and harrowing C-sharp Etude (Op. 10 No. 4), and a morsel of Scriabine farfallonery, the Etude Op. 49 No. 3. In effect these encores were four excellent piano lessons...