Stephen Beus Plays Bold

Attending a recital by a young pianist relatively early in his career has its own special rewards. It is inspiring to contemplate the future of such an aspirant, and the listener can forgive the occasional technical slip or immature phrasing as a necessary step along the way to mature poetic communication. For the first half of his appearance at the Merkin Concert Hall on Tuesday, 2006 Bachauer winner Stephen Beus did not afford his audience that kind of experience.

Rather, he intoned like a veteran, producing a totally professional sound and demonstrating sophistication beyond his years. Unusual for a recent graduate, he embraced the concept of less is more.

Commencing with the Liszt transcription of a Bach Prelude and Fugue in A Minor, Mr. Beus impressed with his evenhandedness, a uniformity of touch sans pedal that made a strong case for Bach on the modern Steinway. By keeping his declamations on an even keel, his lower notes exhibited more power as groundings without any need to make them louder than their upper cohorts. Some slight silences between phrases stressed the drama, while a strong enunciation fostered just the right feeling of gravitas.

To say that I enjoyed the Sonata in E Major of Mendelssohn to the same degree would be a falsehood, but this was not at all the fault of this pianist. Written when Felix was but 17 years old, the piece is like a greeting card sent by your grandmother, filigreed and overstuffed. Only the second movement contained some charming passages, reminiscent of the "Midsummer Night's Dream" Scherzo from the previous year. However, this piece of fluff was performed expertly, Mr. Beus up to the challenge of an awful lot of notes per square inch that never deteriorated into fuzziness. Hopefully, he will retire the work as he matures.

To say that the Hammerklavier Sonata of Beethoven had a five-year gestation period is a slight exaggeration, but it is true that the composer penned very little between 1812 and 1817, crippled as he was by deafness, depression, disease, and domestic disfunctionality (that ne'er-do-well nephew). However, when Beethoven did break out of his doldrums, he did so with a vengeance, producing not only his finest piano sonata, but also the sketches for the opening of the ninth symphony. Before the ink was dry on the sonata — Beethoven stopped the presses to add a slight introduction to the Adagio sostenuto — he dove intently into the greatest of all his compositions, the "Missa Solemnis."

Mr. Beus did a creditable job in the Hammerklavier, this notorious finger-breaker, but he did have several moments of struggle that did not always work out in his favor. He can be a bit of a pounder, as evidenced by the opening passages. There are such daunting technical demands in this piece — Beethoven had just received a new Broadwood piano from England and wanted to explore its outer limits — that it is easy to neglect the underlying poetic expression. Tellingly, the movement that Mr. Beus did the best job of expressing was the slow one, providing a mature understanding of its overarching shape. The Scherzo: Assai vivace was somewhat on the sloppy side, and fugue-like sections of the final movement — Beethoven describes them as con alcune licenze (with some license) — occasionally became tangled, but there was still quite a bit of visceral excitement and youthful enthusiasm on display. Perhaps this work is a stretch at this point in his journey, and may not have been the ideal choice for such an important recital, but it is vital for Mr. Beus to keep himself challenged. Clearly, he is not a coward.