MUSIC REVIEW : Ilana Vered in Benefit Recital

Israeli pianist Ilana Vered makes regular appearances here, generally as an accomplished and forceful practitioner of the more extrovert sort of concerto. Her solo recital Sunday evening, however, was something else again.

Vered’s generous program benefitted the Jerusalem Rubin Academy of Music and Dance, and drew a large and enthusiastic crowd to Leo Baeck Temple. Chronologically arranged, the agenda made a nice capsule history of keyboard style from Scarlatti to Chopin, sharply closed by two Dances by Paul Ben Haim.

The emphasis was on airy grace and poetic nuance, in a grand evening for admirers of trills, turns and filigree of every description. Vered’s touch proved invariably controlled, nimble and superbly pointed, if not infallibly accurate, across a broad dynamic spectrum and on a brand-new Steinway to boot.

The results were beautifully colored, highly personal interpretations. As applied to sonatas by Scarlatti and Haydn, this approach might not please purists, though Vered did muster elegant, persuasive embellishment.

In Mozart’s Variations on “Ah, vous dirais-je, Maman”--and less predictably, in Beethoven’s Variations in C minor--the pianist’s even passagework and the instrument’s very round, mellow sound created minor wonders of lyrical intimacy. The power in the Beethoven Variations was manifest more in crisply defined articulation and expressive contrasts than in sheer pounding.

Strength was again placed in a measured, ruminative context in Chopin’s B-Minor Sonata. Vered’s pliable, singing lines in the Largo were unfortunately compromised by her loudly humming vocal obbligato, an effect apparent at other times but never so prolonged.

The concluding Dances by Ben Haim offered Vered opportunities in vaguely ethnic Debussyean moodiness and a furious toccata a la Prokofiev, opportunities that she capitalized on with interpretive elan and unflagging technique.

Sustained applause finally brought Vered back for a lone encore, a fleet Etude by Moszkowski.