Maryna Mazhukhova is a pianist from Belarus. Belarus brings to mind the Chernobyl disaster, and indeed, her biography includes such events as a United Nations concert commemorating the 10th anniversary of Chernobyl. After leaving Belarus, she continued her studies at the Manhattan School of Music in New York and has performed in many places. David Dubal, author of “Evenings with Horowitz,” praised her, saying, “Maryna Mazhukhova is a pianist of immense talent and sincerity whose performances are filled with emotion, poetry, and depth,” which made me decide to hear her.
Although it is at Carnegie Hall, the venue was the smaller Weill Recital Hall on the 3rd floor.
The first thing I noticed was that the audience was entirely different from that in the main hall. Why was that? Perhaps because the ticket was inexpensive at 20 dollars?
The next thing was that the performance left me thinking, “What?” Wouldn’t a student from any nearby music school play better than this? Her poor pedaling muddied the sound, while in other places the sound could be heard breaking off abruptly. As a result, the music had no continuity. The melodies did not sing, either; it was simply no good. From the opening notes of the 1st piece, Scriabin 1, I had a bad feeling (the sound simply had no substance), but by the time she reached Chopin’s Sonata No. 3, that feeling had become a certainty. In short, it was the level of a student recital. Frankly, even a Japanese high school student could do better.
And so, my conclusion:
In Japan, too, one often sees “performed at Carnegie Hall” listed in a biography, but since anyone can do it as long as they pay, it is no indication of credibility whatsoever. And, for that matter, critics’ reviews cannot be relied on either.
The program that day was as follows.
Maryna Mazhukhova, pianist
Weill Redital Hall at Carnegie Hall
Sunday, May 2, 2004 5:30pmAlexander Scriabin
Sonata No.0 Op.68
Sonata No.10 Op. 70
Two poems, Op.32Frederic Chopin
Sonata No.3 in Bminor, Op. 58Claude Debussy
from Douze Etudes (1915)Franz Liszt
Paraphrase on Theme from Verdi’s “Rigoletto”
Footnotes
- Added 2019/1/8: A performance that appears to be from this concert was on YouTube, so I have included it below.
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