Piano Diary
Andrea Lam (piano)
rec. 2025, Iwaki Auditorium, ABC Studios, Melbourne, Australia
ABC Classic ABCL0114 [79]
I think anyone who plays the piano, be they international virtuoso or most modest of amateurs, can relate to Andrea Lam’s opening paragraph in her booklet notes: life is full of those moments, joyful or tragic, heart-breaking and life affirming when those 88 keys are a constant and steadfast companion. The album’s title describes Lam’s own journey through these moments, music she says gave solace, hope, inspiration, challenged and transported me to a different place.
These glimpses into her past feature some of the most popular and familiar works in the piano repertoire but there are several rarities and unfamiliar music here. The recital actually can be divided into three main genres; romantic music, jazz, scored rather than improvised and contemporary classical with the Aria from Bach’s Goldberg variations as the sole outlier. Some choices come as no surprise, at least to me. Lam follows Chopin’s posthumous nocturne in C sharp minor with Brahms’ intermezzo in A major, both deeply moving, so intimate, neither feeling the need for an audience beyond the performer; Lam has lived with the latter since childhood and displays a lovely warmth of touch and timelessness. The Schumanns, husband and wife are both represented, Robert by the sweeping passion of In der Nacht from his Fantasiestücke and Clara by her A minor Romance. Her romances are beginning to make more appearances on disc and certainly this one and the first of her op.21 set, also in A minor, can hold their own amongst short character pieces by their more famous contemporaries. A song without words from just a few years earlier, Schubert’s Impromptu in G flat major sets the standard for the genre as it developed in the 19th century and, as Lam points out, contains the tension that Schubert described, when I tried to sing of love, it turned to pain and when I tried to sing of pain it turned to love. Granados’ small scale tone poem the maiden and the nightingale expands on those contrasting passions, offering tender intimacy, beautifully captured here, and overwhelming heart-on-sleeve emotions within the space of a few bars while Chopin’s G minor Ballade seemingly holds the whole range of human emotions in its short span, surely one of the keys to its enduring popularity.
The enduring popularity of Gershwin’s songs is already clearly established and for her jazz selection Lam chooses two arrangements by classical pianists. Earl Wild’s outrageously inventive arrangement of I got rhythm, one of his seven virtuoso studies after Gershwin, opens the recital and highlights a period in Lam’s career when she judged the Australian edition of the television show the Piano alongside Harry Connick jr. The multi-talented pianist Tom Poster’s arrangement of someone to watch over me is at the other end of the scale, wistful and reflective. French impression is hinted at in Bill Evan’s timeless Peace piece. Australian composer Melody Eötvös was born to a pianist mother and jazz musician father. She wrote Bachram for Lam in 2025, its title meaning rambunctiousness in Gaeilge, Irish gaelic and the impression given after the forthright opening chords is of seething restlessness, a mood that only breaks into outright boisterous behaviour toward the end where the opening chords are given free reign over the whole keyboard. Kernis’ second Superstar étude is boisterous from the get go and its dizzying mix of note clusters, keyboard-leaping chords and high-wire virtuosity is coupled with a rhythmic energy that is intoxicating even if its musical language is not entirely to my taste. Lam leaned this work in just one week to welcome Kernis to the faculty of Yale school of music and the joy and utter command on display is stunning. Vivian Fung’s three Glimpses for prepared piano were written for Jenny Lin in 2006. They bring gamelan to life at the piano with the first emphasising the percussive nature both of gamelan and piano. The snare drum left hand is coupled with the chimes of the right producing the interlocking rhythms that are called for in its title Kotekan. The high keyboard repeated notes of the second, Snow, suggest biting desolation to me while Chant explores isolated fragments of melody, often on strings plucked directly by the pianist over a low rumbling drone produced by pulling rosined butcher’s twine out of the piano’s depths to eerie effect. Amongst all these soundworlds, romantic, exotic, tranquil, passionate or disturbing Lam places the simple elegance of the aria from Bach’s Goldberg variations, a work she learned during lockdown, a period of time that ironically connected us while keeping us separate; a point in humanity’s diary that we all empathise with.
I really enjoyed this recital. Lam evidently has imagination and a flair for the dramatic and she couples this with a cast iron technique, easy communicative style and a silken tone all recorded in a warm, natural sound.
Rob Challinor
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Contents
Earl Wild (1915-2010)
Etude No.6 after Gershwin’s I got rhythm (1930)
Enrique Granados (1867-1916)
Quejas, o la Maja y el Ruiseñor No.4 from Goyescas (1911)
George Gershwin (1898-1937) arr. Tom Poster(b.1981)
Someone to watch over me (1926)
Frédéric Chopin (1810-1849)
Ballade No.1 in G Minor Op.23 (1835)
Nocturne in C Sharp Minor Op.posth (1830)
Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)
Intermezzo Op.18 No.2 (1893)
Clara Schumann (1819-1896)
Romanze in A Minor WoO.28 (1853)
Robert Schumann (1810-1856)
In der Nacht No. 5 from Fantasiestücke Op.12 (1837)
Franz Schubert (1797-1828)
Impromptu in G Flat Major D.899 No.3 (1827)
Melody Eötvös (b.1984)
Bachram (2025)
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Aria from Goldberg Variations (1741)
Aaron Jay Kernis (b.1960)
Superstar étude No.2 (2002)
Bill Evans (1929-1980)
Peace Piece (1958)
Vivian Fung (b.1975)
Glimpses for Prepared Piano (2006, rev.2016)
