Piano Classics interviews Alexander Gavrylyuk

1)        (Are you familiar with Chopin's early works, his polonaise in G minor for example, composed at age seven?)Do you think it's possible for the seven year old Chopin to contain such developed emotions or was he more likely to have followed traditional musical structures that he was influenced by, picking up the "feeling" of the music along the way?


It has been acknowledged that during his early childhood Chopin already demonstrated an intelligence which assisted him in achieving outstanding musical development so early. I think that there were numerous factors that contributed to the impressive early compositions we know of, like Polonaises in g minor and in B flat, both of which he remarkably composed at the age of seven. In my view most importantly there was God's gift- Chopin's natural talent and musical intuition that played the main role. Then of course there was his special ability to observe and even recreate some of his surroundings. Chopin also had, even from an early age, a wonderful sense of humour which we often hear in his compositions and which is so important in music in general.

Music review: Bramwell Tovey, Alexander Gavrylyuk, Los Angeles Philharmonic at Hollywood Bowl

September 9, 2010 | 12:10 pm- (pulling out parts about Alexander only)

...Gavrylyuk, a Ukrainian in his mid-20s now living in Australia, was on fire in the huge first movement’s three cadenzas – eating up those octaves, the scales burning with visceral power – while drawing a wide variety of clearly articulated color elsewhere.  Coming out of the cadenzas, Tovey picked up on Gavrylyuk’s momentum and ran with it, his astute conducting minimizing such structural roadblocks as the strange pauses in the finale.

Wow the crowd Gavrylyuk did, and he came back with the Liszt/Horowitz circus-like take on Mendelssohn’s “Wedding March,” brimming with a nervous energy that, dare we say, brought back memories of one Mr. Horowitz.  Gavrylyuk sounds like he would be spectacular in Prokofiev; we’ll soon find out, for he recorded all of the concertos last year.

-– Richard S. Ginel