KCMETROPOLIS.org
Kansas City's Online Journal of the Performing Arts

Pianist James Tocco keeps an impressive schedule between teaching duties, concert engagements, and administrative duties for the Great Lake Chamber Music Festival.

David Peironnet decided to ask him about burning the candle at both ends and his upcoming engagement with the Kansas City Symphony where he will be piano soloist for Samuel Barber’s Piano Concerto.

David Peironnet:  You’re a professor at a conservatory in addition to traveling with your concert career, and also serving as artistic director of the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival. Does that keep you busy enough? Would you rather teach or perform? 

James Tocco:  Although in the past I have taught at as many as three conservatories at the same time, in recent years I have cut back on my teaching schedule in order to devote myself more to my performance activities and the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival. I now only teach at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. I think a balance of performing and teaching is essential to my creative process.

DP:  When people think of Samuel Barber, they usually think of the Adagio for Strings. Yet, this composer wrote a lot of music which was both innovative and approachable. Do you agree or disagree that Barber is one of America’s most underrated composers and deserves more recognition?

JT: Barber has never actually disappeared from the concert scene. There are a number of orchestral works that are considered repertoire pieces, such as his First Symphony, and his First and Second Essays for orchestra. Both his piano concerto and violin concerto are performed frequently (in fact, often are works for conservatory competitions). His piano sonata is a staple of the repertoire, as is the cello sonata. And his vocal music is widely performed. I think no apologies are necessary when it comes to Barber’s representation in concert.

DP: You have chosen Barber’s Piano Concerto to perform when you are in Kansas City. What is there about this piece which draws you to it?

JT: I consider it one of the greatest works in the genre composed in the twentieth century. It has everything: compelling melodic invention, brilliant orchestration, and breathtaking virtuosic writing for the solo instrument.

DP: You’ve also recently performed music by Karol Szymanowski, Alban Berg, and John Corigliano. Is there something which draws you to these specific individuals, or is it the challenge of mastering music which is not so commonly found in the concert hall?

JT: Berg is considered the greatest master of the so-called Second Viennese School, and his works are studied and researched by students in every conservatory in the world.  John Corigliano may be the most successful and widely performed composer of my generation. However, what draws me to ANY music is not the reputation or lack of it of any single composer, but what the music speaks of to me personally. I perform only music that I feel I can put my stamp on and call my own.

DP:  When you come to Kansas City, what do you want to bring to us with your performance? What do you want to take with us when we leave the Lyric Theatre and Yardley Hall?

JT: My aim in any performance is to afford the listener a glimpse of life that is perhaps new and undiscovered. I would like my performance to be a revelation in the true sense of the word.

DP: What question should I have asked that I didn’t?

JT: All the others.

PREVIEW:
Kansas City Symphony
Stern Conducts Barber & Berlioz
with James Tocco, piano and
Christin Grossman, viola
Friday, November 19 at 8 p.m.
Saturday, November 20 at 8 p.m.
Lyric Theatre
11^th and Central Streets, Downtown Kansas City, MO
and
Sunday, November 21 at 2 p.m.
Carlson Center at JCCC
College and Quivira, Overland Park, KS.
For tickets call 816-471-0400 or online at www.kcsymphony.org

By David Peironnet

Special to KCM

David Peironnet has been a concert-goer for more years than he would care to admit, and can clearly recall hearing the Kansas City Philharmonic under the baton of Hans Schweiger. This comes from someone who admits to be only 24 years old though acknowleges that his undergraduate degree was not in math but rather political science -- a group of people who are notoriously able to see only those facts they want to see in statistical data.

David has churned out the newsletter for the Friends of the Symphony - Kansas City for six or seven years. He doesn't recall and really doesn't care how many years it has been because the only thing that's important is the next deadline -- and the one after that.

This is one of a series of interviews he runs periodically usually consisting of five open-ended questions which reveal answers which can give information to the person walking into a concert hall for the first time, or like himself have been enjoying concerts for many years.

David and Kathy Peironnet frequently work at the Friends of the Symphony gift shop which is located in the lobby of the Lyric Theatre. The next time you come to a concert, stop by and say, "hello." Ask for a copy of the current FoS newsletter. If a copy isn't available, just ask and one will be mailed to you.

More Featured Articles