About two years ago, after one of Vladimir Ashkenazy’s concerts at the Royal Festival Hall I was talking to him about a piece that is especially close to my heart, the rarely performed Fantaisie de Concert by Tchaikovsky. He agreed with me that it is a good piece that's unjustly neglected and said he would see if we could perform it somewhere. I soon learnt that, unlike many of his colleagues, Maestro Ashkenazy keeps his word and an invitation to perform the concerto with the NHK Symphony Orchestra followed shortly after. Having started working on the piece in earnest, I realised what I got myself into - the hauntingly beautiful, passionate 10-minute cadenza right in the middle of the 1st mo
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