Music Reviews : Pianist Mankerian in Occidental Recital

Pianist Vatche Mankerian presented a deeply satisfying, physically demanding recital ranging from Bach to Khachaturian, with a helping of popular Rachmaninoff and Chopin in between, Sunday evening at Occidental College’s Thorne Hall. Surprisingly, it was the Bach that held sway.

The 27-year-old Mankerian, a member of the Pasadena Conservatory of Music faculty, played Bach’s English Suite No. 2 in A minor in the modern style: Speeds and dynamic accents were forceful, textures and fingerwork were clean, and pedaling was rare.

There was nothing assembly-line about the reading, however. Phrasing with casual grace, Mankerian shaped each of the suite’s movements to display their underlying architecture, showed a profound understanding of Baroque ornamentation, took special joy in the trills that rolled blurry-eyed from his sleeves, and maintained momentum impressively until the big chords of the second Bourree when his concentration faltered. It was a weakness that haunted him throughout the night.

Mankerian continued to excel in two works by Aram Khachaturian, the Toccata and Sonatina, that presented an enjoyable tour through late- and post-Romantic compositional styles.

After intermission, Mankerian began slowly in a short piece by Edward Abrahamian, then came to life in the grotesquely heroic pyrotechnics of Alexander Haroutounian’s “Dance of Sassoon.” He hit full stride again in a set consisting of Tchaikovsky’s Barcarolle, Rachmaninoff’s G-minor Prelude, Opus 23, No. 5, and two Scriabin Etudes. Mankerian ended the official program with a performance of Chopin’s G-minor Ballade, Opus 23 that allowed the famous tunes to fall naturally with quiet poetry rather than forcing the audience to sit up and take notice. As was true throughout the evening, he lacked firepower at the end, but by then it was beside the point.