There are many fine pianists around at the moment, but few genuinely great ones, and one of those is Mikhail Pletnev. His cycle of Beethoven concertos with Christoph von Dohnanyi and the Philharmonia has been a highlight of the musical year in London, and Pletnev brought it to an end with an account of the Emperor Concerto that was by turns majestic, provocative and exquisitely beautiful. The event was designated this year's royal concert but, apart from Gordon Jacob's overblown arrangement of the national anthem, this wasn't the usual collection of mainstream classics.
Dohnanyi has recorded Felix Weingartner's string-orchestra arrangement of Beethoven's Grosse Fuge, but it's difficult to see why he admires it. The expansion seems to lose much from the original quartet version - the wiry abrasiveness, technical challenge and sheer density of the invention. It merely castrates this rebarbative piece and makes it sound like Richard Strauss. It's impossible to generate real tension when 40-odd strings are playing music intended for four, and even Dohnanyi couldn't keep the concentration going right to the end, when so many details that are transcendent in the original became matter of fact.
But he and the Philharmonia were in their element in a glittering, razor-sharp account of Lutoslawski's Concerto For Orchestra. With its breezy neoclassical amalgam of Bartok and Shostakovich, it barely hints at the direction Lutoslawski's music would take a few years later.
As usual, it was impossible to categorise Pletnev's performance of the Emperor. He can do grandeur, but he can also invent the most intimate poetry: his final loving look at the second subject in the recapitulation was exquisite. He delights in contrasts and taking risks, although not everything comes off: the transition from slow movement to finale lacked the magical poise one expected. Perhaps he was too eager to get on to the high spirits of the Rondo, where he enjoyed himself with some outrageous rubato and dazzling technique, both the Philharmonia and Dohnanyi clinging to his coat-tails.
