Ruben Micieli triumphs with Chopin in Florence
A standing ovation for Ruben Micieli at the end of a concert dedicated to Chopin. Not only a celebration in Chopin’s 215th birthday week but also the news that Ruben has been selected to go to Warsaw as part of the Chopin competition selection process. Performances of subtle beauty and mastery that began with the whispered beauty of the D flat nocturne. Ruben allowed Chopin’s bel canto to cast a spell as you might expect from a young musician born in the shadow of Bellini in Catania.
Masterly performances of the first and third ballades showed off this young man’s superb musicianship with masterly performance of aristocratic authority and sensitivity.
The last six of Chopin’s 24 preludes flowed with a natural fluidity from the mellifluous nineteenth where the melody was allowed to float on Aeolian harp strings belying the technical feats that are required. The imperious twentieth played with ever more whispered echoes of extraordinary barely audible delicacy as the bass octaves of the twenty second rang out with a noble voice of commanding authority. Chopin’s own jeux d’eau just flowed from Ruben’s well oiled fingers like water in a brook that was to take us to the heroic outpouring of passionate glory with the final twenty fourth. Played with fearless abandon but like all that this young man did it was imbued with the poetic musicality which is at the very heart of Chopin’s music.
