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The Feelings of Sheer Intelligence New York
Weill Recital Hall, Carnegie Hall
11/06/2025 -
Joseph Haydn: Variations in F Minor, Hob. XVII:6
Franz Schubert: Four Impromptus, D. 899
Robert Schumann: Arabesque, Opus 18 – Kreisleriana, Opus 16
Alexander Kobrin (Pianist) 
A. Kobrin (© Alyona Vogelmann)
“I am really a living keyboard.”
Joseph Haydn
“I have been composing so much that it really seems uncanny at times. I cannot help it, and should like to sing myself to death, like a nightingale.”
Robert Schumann
New York this week is like a Slavic festival. On Wednesday, the Latvian classical accordionist Ksenija Sidorova played Bach, Albéniz and Schnittke. This weekend, Joshua Bell will play a violin concerto by the almost unknown Ukrainian Thomas de Hartmann with Ukrainian‑born Dalia Stasevska conducting the New York Philharmonic Orchestra.
Not to be outdone, Weill Recital Hall tonight gave a recital for the Russian‑born 2013 Van Cliburn Gold Prize winner, Alexander Kobrin. And it is more than coincidence that all five artists have emigrated to other countries.
I don’t know if Mr. Kobrin is still Russian. But he makes his living in this country as Professor at the Eastman School, at Columbus State and New York University. And has been a frequent performer for the summertime International Music Festival. So he is obviously well‑known here and for good reason.
The very first thematic notes of Haydn’s piano masterpiece, the F Minor Variations were played with a simplicity belying the majestic stuff to come. Two of the Schubert Four Impromptus needed a virtuoso. But the first and third had that same natural lyricism which assured his fame. And the concluding Schumann works were a chiaroscuro of many moods.
Mr. Kobrin was, for unusual reasons, was fascinating to watch. His facial expressions never changed, he looked initially stolid and serious. But one realized that was almost religious fascination. And that Mr. Kobrin’s personality was in his fingers, feet and obvious intelligence, rather than a great desire to please.
Yet please he did, beginning with Haydn’s amazing Variations. These were not variations to show off what one could do with a Classical theme. In fact, these were double variations, one mood funereal, the other moderately... well, Haydnesque. The entire piece had started as part of a sonata, but for personal reasons, he enlarged the scope. As well as the challenge for the artist. Mr. Kobrin began with Classical restraint, but soon branched out to a variety of moderately loud but always controlled architecture.
The difficulty may have been in the ornaments and decoration. I don’t have the score, so don’t worry about whether these trills and ripples were written for every note. But with his underlying integrity, one doubts that he improvised.
The Schubert Four Impromptus were disciplined, formally polished performances. But the Third Impromptu was like the most sensitive berceuse. Take away some of the rumbling in the bass, put in some words (“Baaay‑be will sleep now...” and you have the lullaby incarnate.
The two early Schumann fantasies–Arabesque and Kreisleriana–were linked. And for good reason. While the first had an abstract name, and the latter referred somehow to Schumann’s philosophical bent, both were series of different moods, inspirations, dreams, marches and rarely connected Schumann pianistic images.
Both were written in his early 20’s. And while Alexander Kobrin is twice that age, he has a youthful visage, a youthful aura. But he is unlike so many budding pianists younger than 50, he never showed any wish to impress the audience with how loud, how fast, or even how consciously beautifully he could play.
Yes, for the marches, he offered a sudden Sforzando or two, in the Kreisleriana’s Molto agitato, he was supremely energetic (though I believe he preferred the gentler middle section.) Mr. Kobrin’s technical ability is practically boundless (take the second of the Schubert pieces), but he revealed no more of it than was needed for the piece on hand.
Not even in his lone encore–much to the regret of the stand‑up audience–did he attempt to show off his chops. Chopin’s B flat Mazurka was, like Mr. Kobrin himself, graceful, melodic and blessed with warm rationally measured notes.
Harry Rolnick
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