The pianist Víkingur Ólafsson: Poetry – lifestyle starts offevolved at the back of mathematics

In the darkened live performance hall of Elmau Castle, Johann Sebastian Bach’s mythical Goldberg Variations – a cycle of 30 variations on an “Aria” – sound as if from very a ways away, a bit mystical, time-eliminated, unreal.

But this isn't handiest due to the lighting fixtures or the big Wetterstein massif out of doors the windows, that's now within the dark however can nevertheless be felt, but additionally because the Icelandic pianist Víkingur Ólafsson continuously reshapes every observe on this apparently endless collection of variations on a subject, amazedly near and amazedly remote, all at the equal time. He takes the listener into his very own global, which is a terrific mixture of a experience of reality and a musical dream, that can already dissolve in the subsequent variant, dissolving into the earthly in racing runs. The pianist loves extremes, stretches tempos and just as enjoys compressing them again within the subsequent variation.