Chicago Classical Review

Olga Kern’s Chicago appearances have been intermittent in recent years, but in 2026, local audiences have had the good fortune to hear the Russian-born pianist not once, but twice in a single summer. Her first-rate performance of Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto with the Grant Park Orchestra—her debut with that ensemble—boded well for future appearances.

Kern’s recital Sunday afternoon at the Ravinia Festival’s Bennett Gordon Hall, similarly, did not disappoint. The fascinating and thoroughly enjoyable program, as Kern explained at the start of the concert, was a tableau of Sergei Rachmaninoff’s influences, from his idols to his contemporaries. 

The first work on the program was Beethoven’s Ten Variations in B-flat major on “La stessa, la stessissima” from Salieri’s Falstaff. At the outset, Kern’s playing was precise and pleasant, though perhaps overly polite.

Schumann’s Carnaval, despite being second on the program, was the program’s most ambitious work in terms of scale. Kern explained that Rachmaninoff’s recordings of the work were hugely influential to her as a young pianist, and her Russian pedigree was on full display throughout her intensely focused and technically exacting performance.

But despite the enthusiasm that imbued both the Schumann and Beethoven works, one detected a touch of restraint in the way Kern avoided extremes in dynamic contrast or variation in tempo.

In Debussy’s Feux d’artifice, though, Kern’s penchant for gestural and coloristic effect came to the fore. Jagged leaps across the keyboard were delivered with ease, as were the beautifully contrasted glassy flourishes, to great effect. 

What Kern brought to the Schumann in terms of precision and poise was still only preamble for the middle third of the program, which paired works by Rachmaninoff himself with chewy cuts from his Russian compatriots.

Two Etudes from Scriabin’s Op. 42 set the scene. The first of these, No. 4 in F-sharp minor, is atmospheric, plush and subtly impressionistic. Kern’s reading was both velvety and buoyant, propelled by a left-hand ostinato of tumbling arpeggios over which the melody rung out with the clarity of a bell. Etude no. 5, in C-sharp minor, has much more bite, though animated by a similar mechanism: a propulsive left-hand figure, to which Kern brought a similarly fluid and supple touch. 

The program was performed without intermission, though Tchaikovsky’s Méditation offered a bit of sunny respite between sets of stormier Russian fare. Again, Kern’s balanced approach carried this work’s success; a firm, confident delivery of the work’s earnest theme and an overall sense of levity eschewed melodrama and bombast.

If the program up until this point was a foretaste of the Rachmaninoff show, then the main event was truly excellent. A trio of works representing the composer’s early, middle, and late periods demonstrated both the composer’s (and the pianist’s) range, while illuminating connections to the program’s complementary works.

To the first of these, Moment musical in E minor, Op. 16, no. 4, Kern brought an understated intensity — a constant simmer, rather than a rolling boil. A tasteful deployment of sustain pedal smudged the growling ostinati while maintaining utter clarity of the plaintive melody. The keyboard is a symphonic force all its own in Kern’s hands; layers of countermelody and accompaniment fold beautifully upon one another; texture and line are clearly articulated, but never threaten the melody, which is often marked by a sense of urgency and uncommon clarity.

In the second installment of the Rachmaninoff triptych, Kern evinced another kind of virtuosity. Her sober interpretation of the Étude-tableau in G minor, from Op. 33, melded the work’s dueling moods of broody Russian affect and Slavic folkiness by steering clear of ponderous introspection. 

Polichinelle in F-sharp minor was the spikiest of the three. At last, whatever power or heft Kern had been holding in the tank in the program came pouring out in this resonant and tremendously satisfying execution.

The only interpretive missteps of the program came with George Gershwin’s Three Preludes. Kern noted from the stage that some of Rachmaninoff’s later works showed evidence of influence by the younger American composer. But if the Russian managed to successfully ingest Gershwin’s influence in his own works, the same could not be said of this performance.

The melody of the first Prelude is a spiritual precursor to the theme from An American in Paris, though Kern’s frenetic tempo made it challenging to appreciate the commonality. The sultry second Prelude, which could have been plucked from the score to Porgy and Bess, was more effective, though the unneveness of Kern’s rubato imbued it with a lope that was halting rather than expressive. The third, subtitled “Spanish Prelude,” was played with apt intensity, but the resulting heaviness evinced that this reading may have benefited from a lighter touch.

Earl Wild’s Virtuoso Etude No. 7, after Gershwin’s “Fascinating Rhythm,” offered a more idiomatic corrective. Wild’s etude gives Gershwin’s melody rollicking ragtime treatment that morphs into a spiral of pianistic filigree. Kern took a rhapsodic approach that favored the expressive elements of the work without dimming the virtuosic brilliance of Wild’s showpiece.

An eclectic trio of encores offered a surprisingly substantive digestif to append this sumptuous meal. 

Prokofiev’s Etude in C minor was a brief, tempestuous episode delivered with all the intensity and vigor of the preceding Rachmaninoff selections. An elegant cordial called Spinning Wheel by the obscure Swiss composer Charles Samuel Bovy-Lysberg followed. Kern closed the afternoon with “Sparks” by Moritz Moszkowski, heard here in an elaborated version made famous by Vladimir Horowitz— a fitting end to this program’s homage.

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