Also this issue: Aimless by Design Indie elders Yo La Tengo finally get their day in the Sun. -Sam Adams Prcss of Elimination Estranged rock band converges on Philly and drops the vowels. -Maura Johnston Klasik Sundayz -Ainé Ardron-Doley Levon Helm & The Barn Burners -Nicole Pensiero The Postal Service -Paul Burress Dave Holland Quintet -Kyle Parker Assemblage 23 -Helen Thompson Kevin Burke -Mary Armstrong

April 17-23, 2003

musicpicks

Evgeny Kissin

Child prodigies have a tough burden. After all, what's an ex-prodigy? Hopefully, a mature and successful artist, but in most cases the excitement of earlier triumphs is never quite recaptured, and in some unfortunate examples, the charm of naive talent gives way to pretense and even crisis. But there are great exceptions, such as the violinist Midori, and the Russian-born pianist Evgeny Kissin. Kissin's fame was forged in the very hearth of great pianism, Moscow, where he astonished a supremely sophisticated audience with back-to-back performances of the two Chopin concertos at the age of 12. Twenty years later, it is widely agreed that the promise of youth has blossomed into rare instrumental genius, with frequent comparisons to Horowitz. Kissin's technical control of the piano is complete and utterly natural, and so it is just a matter of what he wishes to make of it. His manner is powerful, delicate, texturally intricate, poetic and intellectually direct. At his best, he removes the barrier between the composer's vision and the ears of his audience. For his first solo recital at Verizon Hall, Kissin has programmed two composers, Schubert and Liszt, in material ranging from the sublime, as in Schubert's magisterial final piano sonata, to the spectacular, including the fiery Mephisto Waltz No. 1 of Liszt. The composers will be bridged by a selection of Liszt's ingenious and beautiful arrangements of Schubert songs.

Mon., April 21, 8 p.m., $21-$77, Kimmel Center, 260 S. Broad St., 215-893-1999.

—Peter Burwasser