As a young pianist, Julius Asal already feels remarkably mature and poised for his age
Together with pianist Julius Asal, the orchestra of Academy of St Martin in the Fields opened the evening with Maurice Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin. This is a deceptively difficult piece, seemingly light-weighted, but in fact rather multi-layered where Ravel’s mourning of his friends has been covered in its Baroque extravaganza. Conducted by first violinist Jacqueline Shave, the ASMF orchestra approached it with restraint and classical poise.
At the beginning, however, the interplay between woodwinds and strings felt somewhat unsettled, and the winds were momentarily obscured by the strings, producing a blend that was more blurred than integrated, failed to equally share in colouring the pulses of the movement. But as the movement progressed, the textures opened up, and the woodwinds began to weave gracefully through the increasingly radiant strings.
As a young pianist, Julius Asal already feels remarkably mature and poised for his age. Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 22 in E-flat major is not the most “popular” Piano Concerto in Mozart’s repertoire – the last time I heard it live was with Till Fellner at the Barbican, just before the pandemic. Fellner gave the work a sense of effortless grace through a well-paced manner, Asal approached the concerto with restraint and respect, shunning away from overtly “free” virtuosity or eccentric interpretation. If a few of the cadenzas occasionally lacked crisp clarity, he played with a natural fluency when dialoguing with the orchestra.
In Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G major, however, Asal’s artistry became entirely different. Whereas in Mozart he was caressing almost each note, here he was more lyrical and playful. This piece still bore his trademark care and delicacy, but there was also a freer, more imaginative spirit. Sometimes his playing reminded me of Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 3 in C major, just a bit more expressive and more modern. In the Allegro especially, Asal allowed himself to be more unbridled. The piece occasionally felt as if the soloist and the orchestra were speaking past each other and lacked engaging.
While Piano Concerto No. 22 carries breadth and grandeur with a touch of delicacy, the Academy of St Martin in the Fields gave it an energy that felt charged, powerful, and brightly lit – not metallically bright but high- saturated colours. This same raw liveliness also reached full expression in Mozart’s Symphony No. 31, the “Paris”. Here the orchestra seemed to play as if unsealed, with woodwinds and strings blending seamlessly. The opening Allegro illustrates both bustling Parisian streets and a city in bloom. This chamber-sized ensemble lavishes on Mozart’s most opulent radiance. In the Andante, the woodwinds played with a lightness and agility that felt airborne, while in the Allegro the percussion and brass brought grandeur of scale that remained refined rather than overbearing.