If you have picked up any intelligence about the Russian-German pianist Igor Levit, it is surely that he cannot resist a marathon. The demands of performing long works, alone on stage, do not need spelling out. The motivation for Levit, evident in every note he plays, is the music. In early lockdown in 2020, when the world was reeling and the technology itself had not been mastered, Levit embarked on nightly, livestreamed concerts from his Berlin home for more than 10 weeks. In addition to standard repertoire, he plays epic compositions few dare touch, whether the piano concerto by Ferruccio Busoni (a trifle at 75 minutes) or Erik Satie’s Vexations (20 hours).
At Wigmore Hall last week, Levit chose two giants of the repertoire that he has recorded and performed in public before. This makes the achievement no less extraordinary. He began on Monday with Shostakovich’s 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op 87, with Passacaglia on DSCH by the Scottish composer Ronald Stevenson (1928-2015) two nights later.
