Schiff’s Return Proves Worth the Wait

It was a connoisseur’s program Andras Schiff brought to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion on Monday night, and the connoisseurs, including an impressive number of fellow pianists, hungrily attended the Hungarian-born musician’s first local recital in several years.

They were not disappointed. In an intellectually stimulating agenda of sonatas--13 by Domenico Scarlatti, one apiece by Haydn and Schumann--Schiff highlighted, caressed, polished and rejuvenated music largely unfamiliar to the “Appassionata” Sonata crowd.

His audience, rapt from start to finish, listened carefully, applauded appropriately and coughed only discreetly.

The listeners’ attention was rewarded with myriad musical felicities: An entire range of emotions and moods in the Scarlatti sampling; Haydn’s irrepressible mastery in a commanding reading of his E-minor Sonata, Hob. XVI:34; a fully realized revival of Schumann’s seldom-heard Sonata No. 3.

Schiff’s single encore retained the seriousness of the occasion; it was Mozart’s Adagio in C, K. 356, originally for the glass harmonica.

For the kaleidoscopic Scarlatti first half, an enterprising impresario might have found a way to use the supertitle mechanism above the Pavilion’s proscenium to keep listeners apprised of which item Schiff was performing, and/or to give short descriptions of the pieces.

How about “An Enchantment” for the ninth sonata he played, the one in E-major, Kirkpatrick No. 395; or “Perfectly Serious,” for one of the evening’s emotional high points, the Sonata in G minor, K. 426?

In any case, Schiff’s musical overviews and the nuances he brought to each Scarlatti item marked its unique character. His playing was never less than clarified and beautiful.

After the intermission, the pianist’s abundant keyboard resources continued to illuminate. He delivered an aggressive yet highly sensitive re-creation of the Haydn work and gave Schumann’s F-minor Sonata its due in contrasts and passion, while avoiding overstatement. Producing full-bodied performances without taxing the instrument is what Schiff does best, at a time in history, it seems, when restraint is not a pianistic priority.