Wu Di (final recital)

Just like she did with the Clara and Robert Schumann pieces in the semis, she played the first two pieces with no applause break between them. This time it was Bach's Toccata in F-sharp minor and Schoenberg's Klavierstucke. It takes nerve to program Schoenberg at any stage of the competition, and especially in the finals. (I would have been even more impressed if she'd chosen Schoenberg's Piano Concerto.) The Bach was played with precision and momentum, and the Schoenberg with great purpose, especially in the final piece. However, Ken Iisaka, sitting next to me for this session, noted that she missed quite a few notes. He's more familiar with this piece than I am, so I'll take his word.

Di Wu was our last shot at a satisfying Gaspard de la Nuit, and she came closer than anybody else did. I didn't need Ken to distinguish the measure she omitted from the early going of "Le gibet," which featured the repeated B-flat note throughout the piece being played in an atypically dry manner. The various renditions of Gaspard this year have all been missing the element of black magic, and Di Wu supplied it in spots, like the big swell of notes at the end of "Ondine," representing the mermaid taking her rejection (in a huff, judging by Wu's rendition) and swimming away. The pianist was at her best in "Scarbo," evoking the presence of the evil creature in spine-tingling fashion. This made me forgive some of the inexactitude in the piece's many leaping configurations. I wonder if fatigue is starting to get the better of Di Wu. We'll know more after her concerto performance tomorrow.

Zhang Haochen (final recital)

This is the second time I noticed the kid wiping off the piano keys with a cloth before he'd even started playing, and before anyone else had played before him. Why does he do that?

He started with Brahms' Variations on a Theme by Handel, and played it with a great deal of rhythm and alertness. I'm struck by the total lack 0f resemblance between this assured, strong-willed solo recitalist and the anonymous pianist he's turned into in a chamber or orchestral setting. Well, he gave a strong sense of each variation growing out of the original theme, and the different numbers seemed to progress logically one after the other, which is important when you're playing variations. Other than that, he also took pains to differentiate each number from the ones around it, and the final variation showed off his considerable skills as a contrapuntalist.

Unfortunately, Zhang's other recital item was Gaspard de la Nuit, and he prettified the piece, which is not only totally wrong, but was also a tactical error, since he can't match Bozhanov, Son, or Wu when it comes to beauty of tone. He had no sense of the piece's eroticism and violence. In "Ondine," he evoked the waters well enough but completely missed the alluring mermaid dragging sailors to their deaths. "Scarbo" was lacking the goblin's malevolent mischief. Without forward momentum, the work was reduced to an empty showpiece. All he had left was to show that he could handle the gigantic technical hurdles in the piece, and we already knew that he could. This was not a good selection for him.

Mariangela Vacatello (final recital)

An Italian playing the Italian Concerto! If that seems a bit predetermined, Vacatello didn't play it that way, delivering an Italian with more point and less color than Vondracek, though there was still plenty of color. I particularly liked the gentle but insistent rhythm she put under the "Andante." She then played Chopin's Rondo in E-flat, a relatively obscure piece that she rendered with aristocratic elegance and no small amount of humor. She couldn't convince me that the piece deserved more of a hearing (I think she could have done as well with a couple of Chopin's waltzes), but the pianism was attractive.

Then things took a bad turn with Gaspard de la Nuit, the first of three performances of this in this final round, after we had only one in the prelims and none in the semis. There were some slips in "Le gibet" and "Scarbo," but I could have forgiven those if she played it with the right unwholesomeness. This is a piece that needs to smell like death, and so far we don't have any evidence that this pianist can conjure that up. There was no edge of menace in any of the sections, and "Le gibet" lost all forward momentum. There was so little tension in "Scarbo" that I wondered if she wasn't just running out of gas at this point.

She did manage to rescue herself a bit in Shostakovich's Prelude and Fugue in D-flat major, preserving the Russian dance-like character of the piece and even playing it with a ferocity that she really could have used in Gaspard. It was a rousing conclusion, though I'm still not sure about her prospects going forward in this competition. She's got the two concertos left to play.

Wu Di

Like So-yeon Lee before her, Di Wu places her given name ahead of her surname, and she turned out to be the best colorist we've heard so far. (Even better than Spencer Myer, a frightening thought.) The first of many Chinese pianists here, she came out in a nifty purple and pink dress. She started with yet another Haydn performance that left me unmoved, although the other critics in the press room were raving about it. She won me over with her version of Ravel's Miroirs, evoking the waters in "Une barque sur l'ocean" with astonishing facility and capturing the Spanish flavor of "Alborada del gracioso". What is it with these Asian pianists and their affinity for Spanish music, by the way?

Her final piece, Liszt's transcription of the waltz from Gounod's Faust, struck me as a bit too calculated in its attempt to end her program with a traditional showpiece; the waltz rhythm in the opening and closing sections was galumphing. Still, she did take those big octaves very well, and the middle section of the piece gave her a great chance to do some exquisite filigree work in the upper register of the instrument. You can make a career out of being a cool, objective colorist if you're really, really good at it, and Di Wu is really, really good at it. She reminds me of the late Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, only we can assume that she won't be as flaky as he was. Very encouraging.

Natasha Kudritskaya

The Ukrainian pianist, a very thin woman, came out in an interesting ensemble that included a black top, brown pants, and lace-up Adidas shoes. (Were they sneakers? Looked like it.) She took some moments spacing out before she started each piece, seemingly trying to get her head in the right place.

She played Chopin's Second Piano Sonata and Ravel's Gaspard de la Nuit, and she was excellent when it came to the lyrical parts, but in both pieces she lacked power. I don't think this is a gender thing; I've seen tiny women produce huge volumes of sound from the piano before, but Kudritskaya couldn't produce the kind of sound necessary to both pieces. Gaspard (unbelievably, this is the only rendition of it we're scheduled to hear in the first round) didn't have that edge of menace that the piece is supposed to have. It's supposed to be dripping with evil.

She did much better with the Scriabin waltz at the end. That was played with delicacy and lightness of touch. This contestant definitely has some talent. I think she could have chosen her pieces better. If she makes it to the next round, her semifinal program might show her off in a better light.