Abduraimov brings keyboard thunder, poetic moments to Romantic program
Pianist Behzod Abduraimov returned to Chicago Sunday for the first time since his Chicago Symphony Orchestra debut in February 2024. The Uzbek musician’s local outing in Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 last year made an impressive if unsubtle impression, and Sunday’s more intimate recital afforded local audiences a chance to hear a different side of the 35-year-old’s artistry.
Subbing for an indisposed Beatrice Rana on this occasion, Abduraimov’s program roved widely across the 19th century, opening with Brahms’ Four Piano Pieces, Op. 119, where he was largely attuned to the late work’s autumnal qualities. He plumbed shimmering soft dynamics in the sighing Intermezzo in B Minor, and brought out the nervy agitation of the ensuing one in E Minor. The C Major Intermezzo had the slightest boisterous whiff of Brahms’ teenage experience as a dance hall pianist, and Abduraimov brought a regal spirit to the closing Rhapsody in E-flat Major, though the melodic thread was fitfully lost in its denser textures.
Czerny’s Variations on a Theme of Rode, Op. 33, followed as the afternoon’s greatest discovery. Known today primarily for his mechanical agility exercises, Czerny was in fact a prolific composer of piano music, generating an enormous corpus during his almost monastic bachelor life. The Op. 33 variations set an affecting arioso theme by the French violin virtuoso Pierre Rode, which Abduraimov offered with poised eloquence. Czerny gives this unassuming material inventive, witty treatment, that at moments belies his studies with Beethoven, including episodes of seemingly impossible velocity that Abduraimov unflinchingly dispatched.
The first half closed with Liszt’s Dante Sonata, which is built around two themes—an ominous descending motive and a luminous melody, evoking Hell and Heaven—or perhaps Dante’s Beatrice—respectively. Hell is depicted with Liszt’s predictable chromatic bombast, which Abduraimov whipped into an infernal cacophony, while deftly negotiating the interplay with the contrasting celestial material, before closing the work with hair-raising force.
Abduraimov seemed somewhat out of his element with Debussy’s Suite bergamasque, which opened the second half. The Prelude felt earthbound, lacking the fantasy feel one hopes for, and the ensuing Menuet was missing its essential dancelike quality. Abduraimov nonetheless offered an exquisite Clair du lune, creating an atmosphere of limpid stasis, though the final Passepied was again overly literal.
The program closed by dipping into the 20th century with Stravinsky’s Three Movements from Petrushka, and here Abduraimov was at his finest. The “Russian Dance” went with propulsive flair, and Abduraimov fully projected the improvisatory pantomime of “Petrushka’s Room,” punctuating its intricate textures with clangorous eruptions. The final “Shrovetide Fair” felt as technicolor as the full orchestral treatment, with Abduraimov dispatching its thorny demands with edge-of-the-seat virtuosity.
Thunderous applause brought Abduraimov out for two encores. He played Rachmaninoff’s Prelude in G Major, Op. 32, no. 5, with a flowing ease that felt like a palate cleanser after the complexities of Petrushka. He closed the afternoon with Liszt’s “La campanella” from the Grandes études de Paganini, effortlessly negotiating its chiming pyrotechnics.
The cell phone culture at concerts continues to deteriorate, even at the normally well-behaved Symphony Center Piano Series. In the lower balcony, a patron scrolled on a glowing screen throughout the performance, and the second half in particular was bedeviled by intrusive electronic jangles.
Pianist Hayato Sumino performs music of Bach, Chopin, Gulda, Kapustin, Ravel, and his own works 3 p.m. November 16. cso.org
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Posted Nov 06, 2025 at 10:38 am by Chuck
When a cretin inserts his glowing screen into my field of vision at concerts I surreptitiously aim the laser pointer at his screen or hand and move the laser wildly. It works. The screen at Sunday’s concert was outside my field of view or would have otherwise been deployed. Nicely informative and accurate review as usual.