It has always amazed me how classical musicians are able to perform a twenty-minute long sonata without a note of music in front of them. Pianist Sasha Gerzelj-Donaldson was no exception, performing with precision and care a programme of her favourite German romantic music.
In the lovely setting of St Andrew’s and St George’s West Church, Slovenia born Gerzelj-Donaldson opened her forty five minute mini concert with Beethoven’s ‘Sonata No. 13, Op. 27 No.1’, the much overlooked prelude sonata to the famous ‘Moonlight Sonata’. Gracefully playing her way through the ‘Andante’ all the way to the final ‘Allegro Vivace’, Sasha did the little known sonata justice, able to play with ferocious energy in the second movement and tender expression in the third.
Moving onto another favourite composer, Franz Schubert, Sasha performed his ‘Impromptu No. 3, Op. 90’ with all the melodic yearning the composer intended, carefully and seamlessly moving from each expressive section. The final composer to make an appearance in the programme was Johannes Brahms and his ‘Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel, Op. 24’, a piece otherwise known as ‘Brahms-Handel’. An energetic and lively piece, Sasha had no problem jumping her hands along the piano and resettling into a different mood at each new variation.
Even without an orchestra, Sasha brought out the delicately rich harmonies in each piece and it would have been fantastic to have heard more of her repertoire and to have had a larger audience to appreciate her talent.
