Leo Smit Shows Strengths in Recital

On paper, it may have seemed like just another Wednesday night piano recital at the museum, music courtesy of dead white guys. But Leo Smit showed up.

The 75-year-old American pianist and composer wasn’t there to noodle or rehash. His program--in the Bing Theater at the L.A. County Art Museum--pointedly explored the music of three composers with radically different approaches to the keyboard. His playing was deeply probing, strongly felt and clearly wrought. Each piece, apparently, was his favorite.

Six works by Debussy were delivered with rapt concentration and meticulous detailing. They emerged in single breaths, not parts. The Prelude “Des Pas sur la Neige” became a miracle of stillness, the musical thoughts dangerously extenuated yet never sagging.

Two Etudes illuminated each other through contrast: “Pour les Arpeges Composes,” a brilliant splash of arpeggios, and “Pour les Huit Doigts,” a blur of scales--both sparklingly performed, never over-pedaled. Throughout his Debussy group, Smit revealed a perfect understanding of the weights and measures, the voicings, the light and shadow that make up Debussy’s palette.

Smit began with Bach’s lengthy Partita No. 4, in a reading suitably plain in its approach--the music, not pianistic effect, was the focus. Clarity and warmth, with gently curving legato lines, made the music glow.

To his Chopin set, Smit brought a fluid sense of rhapsody, a feeling that the music flowed extemporaneously. But never did he turn the mirror on himself, fussing over nuance. His tempo rubato only seemed to drive the music onward, not pull it back.

The “Polonaise-Fantaisie” emerged clearly in all of its ornate grandeur. Six neglected Mazurkas tumbled amiably in their quirky modulations, misdirections and popped rhythms.

Smit made the whole evening an adventure, an ear-opener, important.