It seems unlikely that Ralf Gothoni would win any prestigious piano contests other than the one he did win-the Irving Gilmore Artist Award, in which contestants are not aware that they are competing. He and the contest are both unique, in ways that do credit to them both.
In a dazzling Ravinia recital Thursday, the Finnish-born artist showed the qualifications needed for winning most piano competitions: massive technique, no speed limit and every variety of touch from feather to sledgehammer.
He also showed one qualification most juries find hard to swallow, individuality. Gothoni has his own ideas on how masterworks should be played, and he puts a stamp on them as personal as a fingerprint.
That became clear even before he had played a note: The audience was asked not to applaud after the opening work, and instead listen for “strong connections” between it and the Liszt sonata that followed.
The piece is Gothoni’s own transcription of an “Aria” from “Sonate d’intavolatura,” by Domenico Zipoli, a little-known contemporary of Bach. It is a lovely miniature, a meditative melody over quiet chords, but any kinship between it and Liszt’s mountainous masterwork is hard to detect.
The Sonata in B Minor is a torrent of music that seems to have swept Liszt himself along with it; he didn’t even try to divide it into movements. The performer doesn’t so much play it as explore it, and it takes a powerful pianist to navigate it all.
Gothoni discovered new country in it. His playing carried conviction at every moment, from the menacing quiet of the opening to the boil and glitter of Liszt’s terrifying (to pianists) octave passages.
The Sonata in B-flat holds the same towering place in Schubert’s work as the B Minor does in Liszt’s, but Schubert’s sonata is one long skein of melody; even the passages connecting the tunes are tunes. There are shadows in it-the menacing bass trill that punctuates the first movement-but they give it depth and dimension.
Gothoni is plainly in love with the piece. Though he took the third-movement Scherzo at dizzying speed, his playing overall was unhurried; he used none of the shortcuts supplied by editors who thought they were improving it. This was a leisurely trip though Schubert’s Austrian countryside and his own serene, guileless soul.
Gothoni allowed his cheering audience one encore, a transcription-his own presumably-of Schubert’s song, “The Brook.” It was a quiet, introspective ending to an adventurous concert, and it strengthened one impression: Gothoni is primarily a musician, and after that pianist.
Gothoni this year joins the faculty of the Steans Institute for Young Artists at Ravinia. He will be a welcomed and valuable addition.
