SAVILIAN NICHOLAS WALKER – FREE PRE-LUNCH CONCERT
Hailed by the London Evening Standard as a ‘prodigy, of awesome technical fluency backed by exceptional artistry’, Nicholas Walker possesses a rare combination of talents combining sensitivity with ‘the flair of a full scale virtuoso and a sparkling intelligence’ (BBC Music Magazine). He studied at the Royal Academy of Music, where he won all the major awards for both piano and composition, and subsequently at the Moscow Conservatoire.
While still a student in Moscow, he won the First Newport International Piano Competition and has since played with major British Orchestras, given recitals worldwide, and recorded for the BBC, BMG, ASV, Chandos, Danacord, Toccata Classics and Naxos. Equally at home in chamber music, he is sought after as an imaginative and sensitive accompanist, and his CD with Lydia Mordkovitch of Russian music was Daily Telegraph CD of the week.
Although Walker’s performances of Beethoven have brought him special notice, and his performances of the lyrical and late romantic piano music have also been singled out for the highest praise, it is for his championing of the cause of the neglected leader of ‘The Mighty Handful’, Mili Alexei Balakirev, that he is best known. Described by the Financial Times as ‘the nearest thing to a natural Balakirev performer’, Walker’s two discs of Balakirev piano music for ASV received great critical acclaim, and he has also received high praise for his performances of other Russian composers, including his live recording of the Liapunov Sonata on Danacord, described by Jeremy Nicholas as ‘thrilling… a tour de force’
His now complete series for Naxos Grand Piano is however unique, in that it introduces music that has never before been performed or published, including a substantial sonata and works that Nicholas has finished off himself. All the CDs garnered enthusiastic reviews, and CD3 was CD of the week on Musiq3. James Harrington of the American Record Guide has called them the “reference set”; Damian Thompson, writing in the Spectator, said that the series “has to be heard to be believed”, while Jeremy Nicholas in the Gramophone described the playing as “bravura with integrity”.
Nicholas’s next recording project is a double CD of all the Liszt etudes and the Sonata in B minor.
https://www.youtube.com/user/NicholasWalkerPiano
Programme:
Franz Liszt (1811-1886) – Transcendental Études, S.139 (selection)
No.1 Prelude (Presto)
No.2 Molto vivace
No.3 Paysage (Poco adagio)
No.4 Mazeppa (Presto)
No.5 Feux follets (Allegretto)
No.7 Eroica (Allegro)
No.11 Harmonies du soir (Andantino)
No.10 Allegro agitato molto
Two Concert Studies: Waldesrauschen and Gnomenreigen