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Bad Reviews
Winners & Masters Swiss Cheese Young people, thinks X at least, want it loud, quick and heavy. That's why he's written a piano piece that conjures up the animating power of slowness - no, more still: the 'feeling of a fulfilled body, mind and spirit'. 'Silence is sexy', it says with provocative frivolity, but otherwise envelops itself modestly in a fluffy blanket of tinkling vacuities. And he is promptly overtaken on the inside by Y, born in 1976, who in 'Crepuscolo nel Gianicolo' abandons himself to romantic reveries: the pealing of bells mingles with a Roman chorale. Very much an evening piece, very reflective. Very unsexy. These Swiss miniatures, wedged in fast between Brahms and Schubert, were given their world premières by the pianist Oliver Schnyder in the Gasteig. Schnyder's CV swanks to overflow with prizes and scholarships, such that we can assume that the young fellow with the sensitive grimaces is at least a winner, if not yet a master. Why these Swiss morsels had to be served completely without salt or pepper, even he can't explain - not to mention the puzzling fact that a young composer should so enjoy striking the pose of an effusively enraptured aesthete. X and Y, despite their great difference in age, are depressingly interchangeable. They draw their inspiration from chorale-like harmonic sequences, while X also gives a nod to Chopin and reminds one of Liszt. Their common, metaphorical 'bass line' is contrasted with a little, lighter-toned mish-mash. And despite the brevity of these Albumblätter, they also show a great disinclination to either pun or punchline. Switzerland isn't normally this boring! (CP, Süddeutsche Zeitung, 27. 11. 2001)
(The review by all accounts caused the young critic some problems. With the benefit of hindsight, the title and the closing words of his riposte should probably have been omitted. But we always meet twice in a lifetime: three years later, this CP rang me up in order to arrange an interview for the Bavarian Radio. When the highly sympathetic young man then turned up with his microphone, and we chatted about Benjamin Britten's Piano Concerto, I admitted to him that I was perfectly able to remember him. Well, I was able to offer some strong coffee. Since then, we've developed a really good relationship. As proof that we can today both have a laugh about Swiss cheese: when he invited me to eat at his place, the menu included 'Chäschüechli' - traditional Swiss cheese quiche!)

Bad Reviews

Winners & Masters