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AN INTERVIEW WITH MATTHEW GRAYBIL

Matthew, your recital on November 16, 2025 will be the seventh time you've performed in our region as a soloist. What have you been up to in the last year?

I have spent a lot of the last year focusing on performing chamber music, which I've come to love more and more as time goes on. This past year I've had a chance to perform some of my all-time favorite works with some close friends who happen to be some of my favorite musicians.

How does your program for November relate to previous recital programs you've given, and how is it different?

They're similar in that they feature music that takes advantage of the glowing acoustics of St. John's. On this program, the first is centered around Austro-German composers and is more Apollonian and structured. The second half features works by French and Russian composers (Lili Boulanger, Scriabin and Rachmaninov) all of which explore the colorful and sonorous aspects of the piano.

Ferruccio Busoni appears in the program. What do you have to say about his influence on the history of piano playing, and more specifically his compositions for the piano?

Busoni was a major and complex figure in the late 19th and early 20th century. Kurt Weill famously said upon his death in 1924 that “one of the greatest artistic personalities of all time has passed.” As a pianist, he was by all accounts a titan although certainly not a purist. As a teacher he taught an eclectic generation of musicians such as Guido Agosti, Percy Grainger and Egon Petri. As a composer he's perhaps best known for his transcriptions of Bach, some of which I will perform in November. He sees Bach with an organ-like depth of sonority and a romantic sensibility. They're really recreations of Bach rather than transcriptions. His original compositions include a 70 minute piano concerto which is a summation of all that has been previously achieved in terms of piano technique.

Do you find that the keyboard music of Bach is performed less frequently by pianists today? Aside from Grigory Sokolov and Andras Schiff, what pianists have been presenting Bach?

Yes, I've noticed the trend as well. Bach is a canvas on which a performer can go in so many different directions and find a unique voice. I recently asked a group of young pianists why there is a tendency not to program Bach's music and their consensus was, particularly on the competition circuit, that it's too risky. Most jury members, whether they would admit it or not, have deeply ingrained and individualistic views on how Bach's music should be interpreted and a competitor is unlikely to appease a wide range of perspectives with a given performance. I can't be sure whether this is the reason for the trend as a whole but it's an interesting anecdote. That being said, there's still a cohort of prominent (and young) pianists performing Bach. Víkingur Ólafsson has been receiving acclaim for his Bach as, more recently, has Yunchan Lim.

Rachmaninoff and Scriabin or featured in the second-half of your program. How do they complement and how do they contrast as composers?

Rachmaninov and Scriabin were famously classmates at the Moscow Conservatory along with the great pianist Josef Lhévinne (the early Scriabin Prelude for the LH that I will perform was allegedly written after Scriabin injured his right hand after overpracticing after hearing Lhévinne). While their early music was of a similar late-romantic vein, they went in very different directions.

Scriabin died at 43 with so many of his artistic visions yet to be realized. He saw himself as a Messiah who could change the world with his music. His unrealized plans included works that would combine music with aromas, colors and even hallucinogens. It's almost unfathomable what his influence on the evolution of 20th century music might have been had he lived longer. Rachmaninov on the other hand never lost sight of his deeply melancholic Russian soul and his music remained largely unchanged stylistically throughout his life.

Dating from your early years through your Conservatory studies, have there been any piano recitals by artists that you remember particularly?

Yes, absolutely. I particularly remember hearing unforgettable performances from Radu Lupu and Arcadi Volodos growing up. Recently, I've been going to jazz clubs and have been particularly taken with Fred Hersh who is one of the most introspective and individual pianists I've heard live.

Brahms wrote that some of his late piano music pieces were “lullabies for my sorrows.” Some critics have referred to these late works as some of the most complex music ever written. What do you find that is unusually revelatory in works like Op. 119?

Yes, they are indeed complex, introspective and very personal works. Brahms is often seen as a voice of musical conservatism at the end of the 19th century, deeply rooted in classical forms. However, if you listen carefully to the opening of the first Intermezzo from Op. 119 for example, you'll hear a radical sense of harmony with many complex, unresolved dissonances that really pave the way for music in the 20th century. The final Rhapsody also contains one of the most unusual characteristics in music—It begins in major and ends in minor.