MARK HAMBOURG
Russian-British pianist (1879 - 1960)

Mark Hambourg Was born in Russia but moved with his family to England in 1889 to escape the Tsarist regime.  He studied with his father Michael, an eminent piano teacher who had himself studied with Nicholas Rubinstein and Taneiev.  Hambourg recalled: "My father never drove me, though I had great natural facility and learnt in four days at the age of seven The Lark by (Glinka-Balakireff), a work too difficult for me." Hambourg's brothers became accomplished string players.

When Mark Hambourg went in Vienna to audition for Leschetizky, Annette Essipova, the absent master's current wife, heard him play Bach's Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue. She accepted him on the spot.  Leschetizky prepared Hambourg for his Vienna debut in 1894.  He performed Chopin's E minor Concerto with Hans Richter conducting the Vienna Philharmonic to considerable acclaim. The following year he performed Anton Rubinstein's D minor concerto with Nikisch and the Berlin Philharmonic. Once during a Brahms Festival in Vienna he performed that composer's first concerto with the Berlin Philharmonic under Felix Weingartner.  Hambourg learned that Brahms had been in the audience and had sent his compliments.  Anton Rubinstein heard the young Hambourg and recommended him to the noted Berlin impresario Wolff.

He also performed Tchaikovsky's First Concerto under Artur Nikisch and subsequently recorded it with Landon Ronald. Hambourg credited Nikisch and Ronald as the greatest conductors with whom he had performed. And he often spoke of having performed the Beethoven C minor concerto conducted by the great Belgian violinist Eugene Ysaye.

Mark Hambourg was strongly influenced by Paderewski whom he considered "the hero of his earliest youth".  Of others he wrote "I do not suppose that any pianist today could play faster or louder than Moriz Rosenthal, or with more power than Eugen D'Albert, more impressively than Busoni or with greater elegance than Emil Sauer."  Rosenthal, Busoni and Nikisch became his close friends.

Mark Hambourg performed and premiered numerous works by contemporary composers including Debussy, Ravel (Jeux D'eau and Gaspard de la Nuit), Albeniz, Granados, Malipiero, and Villa Lobos.

Hambourg's Chopin is magnificent, a bit eccentric at times, as we might find his playing in general today, but touches of pure genius abound.  The music comes to life in his hands in a very special way.  The nocturnes, in particular, are not the all too often overly sweet night music but rather the somewhat fantastical utterings of the troubled soul of which Chopin was possessed.

The comparison of Hambourg's and Debussy's own performance (albeit a piano roll) of "La plaus que lente" is fascinating.  In this piece, the former's somewhat eccentric tendencies just doesn't work as well for me.

And do not miss the Dvořák Slavonic Dance, beautifully played by Mark Hambourg in a version for solo piano.

Händel  "The Harmonius Blacksmith"

recorded in 1926