Added: 2 years ago
From: LolaAstanova
Views: 52,982
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  • She's going to play at Carnegie Hall....

    I love to read to read the coments.

  • @Deutre08 Wheres the Carnegie Hall? If you attend record it,

  • Her left arm is so sexy <3

  • piece is beautiful

  • what about marrige :-) cuz im avilable and intrested

  • Its all in your music! trust it! there is no need to make extra show .

  • What frightening power.

  • Not the outfit I would have chosen. She looks prettier in her video 'Chopin's etude Op. 25, No. 12'... Great recording, sounds very good, it would have worked perfectly if she had aimed for less pedal. It would have been nice because this piece has a nice texture with which to bang on the piano with little pedal. Being it romantic, it incorporates the feel of the "anti-romantic" russian music that appears to avoid lyricism by ferociously striking at the piano in constant pulse and dynamics.

  • Much music (especially mainstream) today is relatively more rhythmic (monorhythmic) and less melodic.

    Nothing's wrong with that. But when you become adapted to that it's very hard to even understand music like this that hits on so many different emotions/feelings. It can be very unsettling to have music that you can't always predict the feeling or where it's going.

    No movie is good if you can predict the course. You need rises nslopes, uncertainty, etc. This delivers all so well.

  • Best interpretation by far IMHO. Not just in this piece, but her intuition about musical lines (and skill to create them) are uncanny. In every piece she's played she demonstrates this.

    Like a masterful film director she knows when to pull you, push you away, create hope, agitation, strength, anger, and play with ur emotions. All weaved together seemlessly. Not just *a* feeling or *a* vibe. It's a story.

    Nothing's wrong with a film trailer. But this is a whole epic.

  • @TsurugiOni One of the greatest comments i have ever seen

  • By far the best ive heard

  • I love her playing. But I don't understand that she likes flashy clothes. She is an artist, and a really good one after all.

  • @HolidayGolightlyify she lives in new york, thats y she dreses like she does

  • Oh, God.

    Why the hell is she banging so hard?

  • @picardynerd cuz she feeeeelin it!!X)

  • I don't mean to be chauvinistic, but my immediate thought was this isn't going to be good. :L

  • I don't like this at all, it sounds like an awfull frankestein version, copiyng but not understanding any of the good things of the recordings that you emulated. On the other hand.... Lola... you are sooo hot!

  • Great performance with all of the expression and direction. 

  • Dans une des études les plus difficiles du répertoire, la difficulté, une fois les notes faites, est de ne pas perdre la ligne du soprano qui est vite noyée. Bravo, je suis ébloui. Tellement mieux que la vidéo de ce pauvre Stanislas Neuhaus (chromosome avarié). Vous chantez aussi bien que les deux Vladimir.

  • well balanced and perfect control of power. one of the best

  • Good job, congrats on your wonderful piece of pie ;)

  • That was incredible. Now imagine hearing it with the concert hall acoustics... WOW!

  • Decent interpretation.

    I really like the articulation in second variation of the theme. I also like the shaping in the second theme.(The lyrical section)

    I don't like however the bombastic banging in the hemiola variation of the theme(1:58-2:15)

  • The left hand part is hard to connect.

  • Wonderful inner voice

  • now here is someone who is a virtuoso and posses a seemingly innate sense of musical direction, harmonic progression, and precise rhytmic pulse in and out of rubato. great performance. i wonder if she will post videos of an analysis by herself on these pieces she seems to understand so well ...

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  • this piece is one of my all time favorites, and means a lot to me. and i am completely shocked for what i have just seen. i did not expect that kind of interpretation, but you, dear Astanova, you have just put feelings inside of me that i can barely explain...i do thank you so very much...

    greetings from turkey...

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  • A little slow for my preferance, but great playing nonetheless!

  • Marry me?

  • Я плАчу. Переигрываю может, но правда очень трогает, иду смотреть остальные Ваши видео

  • World class pianist. Music is about relating to human emotions. Technical ability is one thing, but understanding music is what makes the greats. How to relay the totality of human emotion / experience through her playing. Chaos, passion, tension, release, expectation, anger, anxiousness. All elements pushed and pulled seemlessly at the perfect moments. A gifted storyteller with the techniques to allow her to unhibitedly express her deep understandings. What an honor.

  • Hopefully one day Lola Astanova will be regarded amongst the best women pianists in the world, along with Clara Schumann, Guiomar Novaes, Valentina Lisitsa & Martha Algerich.

  • I cant believe I just discovered your videos today

  • My God, you bring this music to life like no one else.

  • how much did u pay for steinway & sons?? btw, nice interpretation of scriabin's etude ;)

  • this isn't the easiest of all pieces in the world, but you play it flawless.

  • excelente pianista, una ejecución formidable, no una interpretación, sino una ejecución, pero te hace olvidar de la tecnica y te envuelve la musica....de Scriabin!

  • holy crap that was awesome. I cant wait till I am ready for Scriabin...HIs work is genius, his music divine and you play it very very well! Bravo!!!

  • I hesitate to approach the 42 #5 fingering problem. The Kalmus edition has no fingering either. I'm relegated to using the piece as a LH sight reading exercise. I find that if I create a LH chord from a quarter bar my fingering is clued if I can hear it make sense. My only consolation is from Mrs Lisitsa who asserts that far from set fingerings, she observed that once familiar with a piece her fingering changes from performance to performance.

  • I'd like to make a suggestion .... to support at least one of the legs on a piano with a miniature kickstand ... because that piano was ready to move. Very nice piano playing.

  • I consider Scriabin Etudes to be in the same realm of genius as the Chopin Etudes.

    Everyone is a precious gem surprising us with new facets of experience never thought imaginable.

  • this is the reason i love music so much, its supposed to bring out emotions in you, lola you are amazing and inspiring

  • what fingering do you use in the left hand for opening passages?

  • I love this Scriabin piece thanks to you.

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  • I keep listening to this piece yet the two central lyrical segments still bring tears to my eyes. In them she drives the soprano voice much as Rachmaninoff used the clarinet to lead the lyrical passages in his concertos. Working this piece up could have been laborious. We are grateful to you for it.

  • The girl can PLAY! The interpretation has fine touches,altho finally a bit "calculated" and not enough "let go" for my taste. She could do with a better recorded sound, but obviously has huge talent. Most enjoyable; i'm now going to shift my seat position!

  • If Scriabin were alive ,he would have been mesmerized by her beauty and performance..

  • beautiful performance !!!

  • I'd like to take revenge on her for molesting that keyboard, if you know what I mean...

  • Oh this is some really scary stuff. I thought Horowitz was the final word on this etude. Yikes.

  • I like it very much; the recapitulation, with the sound of the low bass, has a lot of emotion and passion played by you!

  • Please record theses scriabin pieces(etude op8 no12 and op42 no5), I love them so much, and even more the way you play them! I think you play them better than horowitz! Serioulsy you're so much subtler and full of nuances. In this one, you put great pianissimi and the restraint when the main melodie comes out, you make it even more beautiful, my heart hold his beat everytime. You are really talented, you're fabulous! Please please record these scriabin pieces for your next album so we can buy it

  • even if you tryed sooo hard you could never beat her!

  • will you listen to the music or look at the girl ?

    .> do both ^^

  • @mosen17 Clearly she is a very attractive woman. But it is her skill as a pianist and her ability to interpret Scriabin's music that is of interest in the video.

  • @classicalPiano1 agree, but i have to say that im 20 years old and the hormones bomb inside my brain are making the "interpret Scriabin's music" harder to see ( or listen xD)

    i listened the video minimazed :D Truely amazing!

  • @mosen17 Ahh yes twenty years old. I was twenty once. I'm feelin' ya. ;-)

    Etude #5 Op 42 is one of Scriabin's greatest compositions(IMO) (I believe it was one of his favorites as well) . It is noteworthy when someone plays it as well as Lola does in this video. So I really zeroed in on her performance (many times).

    To your point however, she is a very intelligent, charming, well spoken and attractive woman. Hard to ignore that combo .....

  • @mosen17 :D 

  • This piece was well performed.  Love the parts where you completely remove sustain pedal Very well done indeed on a difficult and beautiful piece. . I have marked this video as a favorite.

  • Awesome awesomeness is awesome.

  • THIS IS ART IN ALL ITS EXPRESSIONS, SHE IS BEAUTIFUL, SMART, HAVE TALENT. WHAT ELSE CAN BE ORDERED?

    Talento y belleza, que genial y excitante combinación.

    Talent and beauty!!! is exciting

  • Ungava100: I hope you didn't misunderstand my comments. Horowitz and Astanova both have Slavic/Slavonic backgrounds. Horowitz was born and trained in Kiev, then part of the Russian empire. He concertised in Russia until 1925. The loss of so many family members in the revolution plus 26.6 million countrymen in WW 2 provided more than enough disappointment, frustration and rage to play Scriabin so well.

  • She has great strength throughout her hands. And she plays from memory.

  • Ungava100: Play piano since 70 years. Astanova mixture of hard work and massive talent. Pianists should not have the effrontery to play Scriabin etudes in public unless of a Slavonic/Slavic background as is Astanova. Understanding Scriabin involves reconciling disappointment, frustration and rage musically. Percusiveness is part of it. Be alert to finger stress fractures in teen age wonen visible only in x-ray.

  • Truely amazing!

  • Only 19,000 views? What is this madness?! This is beautiful and this woman has a wonderful gift! I've seen crap get to 10,000,000.

  • @kristalw07 i was just thinking that... share away!

  • DO YOU OFFER PIANO LESSONS??????

  • @PeacefulStrife They'll probably cost you a thousand dollars an hour. Just guessing.

  • @KheldarPr I'd guess about that much as well, hahah.

  • beautiful Steinway & Sons Piano have you got there!

  • bravo. truly original.

  • Your earings are a turn on.  My apologies.

  • SHE IS GOOD

  • how can this much awesome exist in one person??? bravo!!!

  • I bet she wouldn't be getting all this flack is she was an old, caucasian man! Nice try, people. That's raw, AMAZING BEYOND BELIEF talent from GOD. Snarky opinions really take away from youtube. >_> We honestly don't care about your jealous remarks. ;) -shivers from wonderful music- =D And yes. She can be compared to the greats. It just scares everyone that she doesn't fit the status quo. -_- She's actually DOING something with her time.

  • Your Scriabin is refreshing...

    Keep posting on YouTube, you are great!

  • lets see Lola play some harpsichord!

  • CLASS

  • Well done

  • lola that is one FIERCE pose you took at the end!

  • Can this never end?

  • СПАСИБО !!!! MOVED !!!! THANK YOU !!!!

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  • I would watch her play in Lincoln Center ANYDAY!

  • nice playing

  • Clarity, intensity, lyricism, tonal diversity, sensitivity, passion. One of the most inspiring and engaging interpretations of this piece I have yet heard. This music is alive. Outstanding performance!!!

  • You are one of the most sensitive piano players I have ever heard. I truly enjoyed your performance of one of my favorite pieces. Thank you!!! BRAVO!

  • I think this piece is one of the best composed of all time. Especially Horowitz' romantic interpretation makes this piece divine.

  • What a magnificent rendition! This is how I understand this piece (even though I would never be able to play it).

  • omgod 1: thats like the divine passage of the piano piece

  • 1:49

  • it is amazing, could you also play Rachmaninoff Prelude Op.32 No.10

  • Lola..Thank you for reading my post. The problem has been solved. I no longer hear feedback on this and many of the other songs you play for YouTube. I can now enjoy the attenuation you give to the notes. Someone else can compare your musical talent to others, I just wanted to be able to enjoy what you where letting me experience via YouTube.

  • Outstanding!!! BRAVO!!!!

  • I would play the middle section which is so beautiful with more passion but it amazes me that anyone can master that left hand...

  • Nice to see your smooth playing technique. But I'm curious about how a soft and gentle musical interpretation.

    Fleurinus greetings.

  • The comments say your a great piano player. I don't get a chance to enjoy your playing. I'm too distracted by the awful recordings. I've heard much, much better recorded videos from Valentina Lisitsa. I am not here to compare you to her as a musician. However, your YouTube recordings sound like they were recorded from a simple mike and portable unit. Again, I'm not saying she plays better; just sounds better; not the difference I want to hear. BTW: It's not about Bose or Steinway.

  • @gr8tlsnr

    Valentina's videos on Youtube are mostly from a professional DVD video that was produced for her, so of course the sound is going to be better. These videos were simply not meant to have state of the art audio capture.

  • @spreeville All of Valentinas videos; not just from her DVD's sound better. I'm not faulting Lola, for the sound. If she is a "professional" musician, how come her display of piano skill "sounds" the same as the 10yr olds video playing at his/her house. Shouldn't people close to Lola help change how she is being heard on YouTube? That way I may truly enjoy the sound; instead of fearing my headphones may go bad.

  • @gr8tlsnr It sounds the same as 10 year olds in their house because you haven't got the first clue about music.

  • @wayneredhart Again, I'ts not about how the music is being played, it's how it's been recorded. I was hoping for a better recording from a 'professional' musician. I know it can be done from the earlier example I mentioned.

  • @spreeville I tried giving Lola the benefit of the doubt but it's definitely something bad with the way she' s recorded the video. As for proof, Val has raised the bar and can now be seen/heard practicing live for 13 hrs a day until July 4th. Again, I won't compare the talent only the recording of the piano sound.

  • incredible, especially I love your interpretation around the parts with intense dynamic

    changes. and then you have your way of very subtle pauses that makes the music yours. hope to hear you in a live concert. speed on to the top.

  • She is not better - she is different and that's what I like in her interpretation. Play this on a large Boesendorfer and it will sound phenonemal.

  • Wow very nice ....Bella

  • not only full of the hottest fire, but she's technically flawless.

    So how do you improve on that?

  • good job

  • Fantastic!!! Electrifying.

  • To close your eyes on this song is to mis the extrodinary emotion Lola expresses with her face. At moments I felt the only thing missing was a scream of despair. What an Awsomely violent and angry song! and played with equally emense emotion. This one shows how music isn't just the sound and the instrument, but the musician and the symbiosis among all three. I loved it! loved it!

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  • In my opinion, you are all just gushing over the fact that there is someone on Youtube who can accomplish technically demanding pieces without ruining the music. You choose to ignore pianists like Hofmann, Richter, Lugansky, and claim that she is better than them all. I am simply stating my opinion, I think she is a marvelous pianist, however I do not think she is superior to the past greats.

  • @JohnEBPiano Frankly, I think this is vastly better than Richter's performance and that's no exaggeration. Impressive as his big sound is in the climax, he plays the lyrical sections like an absolute dog.

  • Wow! The voicing of the melody is absolutely superb. Most pianists except Horowitz absolutely butcher the lyrical section, but this is really outstanding. I love the way you bring out the left hand thumb at 1.45.

  • I know you don't understand the "sexy" thing so, let me put it a different way: You are extremely attractive and beautiful. I have played Piano my entire life (not 1/2 as good as you) and you are an inspiration. Thank You. I hope I get to shake your hand some day. Just a Piano Player from California.

  • this is absolutely beautiful.

  • EXCELENTE

    1000*****

    me encanta Chopin

    mi hijo tambien toca el piano,

    lo has hecho fenomenal te felicito

    besitos

    anita

  • oh, and i love your style.

  • i've been waiting FOREVER to hear you play this, and i love it!

    such an excellent tempo choice and such great work of the pedal. the combination of those two things and your delicate touch exposes all of this etude's intricacies that would not be heard in other performances (which are usually faster and covered up with the pedal).

    your dynamics are simply and undoubtedly hand and hand with etude's form... there's the calm, then the storm. love it.

    etudes-tableaux sometime? maybe?

  • Awesome Piano and Hott girl! Perfect combo

  • You got several things mixed up. People become legendary after a certain period of time. Especially so in classical music. Horowitz along with other greats was constantly criticized for being loud, not musical, showy, and all about Horowitz until he died. He had critics saying all the exact same things you are saying now about Lola. That's why I think she has a shot at being legendary. She stirs up those same feelings in critics as Horowitz did back in his day. Do your home work JohnEB.

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  • @GreyAlexander913 OMG thats why nobody knows who this horowitz person is!!!

    (jk)

  • you're intense

  • Incredible Lola. Now I have to have you come back to my house again and play this piece in the future (and maybe the Beethoven 31 Diabelli Variations too ?). I will see you March 9th!

  • Great! and a beautiful dress you are wearing there.

    Rachmaninoff's Op39 No5 someday?

  • Superb! This is one of my favorite Scriabin etudes... dark, tempestuous, and manic!

    I hope some of the YouTubers who stumbled upon your Madonna and Rihanna videos will check out some of your Chopin, Scriabin, and Rachmaninoff videos... if not, they're missing out on some musical masterpieces.

    Best wishes with the Haiti benefit concert.

  • Someday, I want to play the piano as well as you do!

    Plus this etude is very beautiful...

  • To "barismertpeker": This piece WAS meant to play w/ intensity!!! It should NOT be played softly throughout the entire piece. This piece IS the epitome of contrast, passion, etc, etc, etc!!! Damn! Excellent performance Lola!

  • Fierce passion! Lola, you are my favorite person of the world.

  • Rachmaninov needs You Tube.

    Astanova owns You Tube.

    Horowitz had his day, and it was

    yesterday.

    nuff said?

  • WOW, Lola! The way you're able to build crescendo starting from the second page to the second theme, and how you are able to raise the volume and add more pedal gradually and simultaneously is extremely impressive! I've heard nearly every recording of this piece and all of them, including Horowitz & Kissin, fall short. Finally, this etude sounds like a coherent piece rather than a clumsy collection of sections. THIS IS REALLY UNBELIEVABLY GOOD!

  • I like her playing, but to say that she is better in interpretation of Rachmaninov and Scriabin than pianists like Horowitz and Ashkenazy? Is she better than Lugansky? Berman? Come on, people. Don't be ridiculous.

  • That's probably the same thing they said about Horowitz and Lugansky before they became well-known.

  • @JohnEBPiano

    Yes, we are saying that! Just because she's not a wrinkled old man who's been playing professionally for some 60+ years doesn't mean she's not as good or even better!

  • Horowitz was best when he was young, the same is probably true of all the other greatest pianists. These people are legendary, they achieved fame and were revered for their piano technique and still are today. You are foolish to say that she is better than all of them.

  • @spreeville How dare you insult Horowitz in such manner? Get lost. Dont even waste your time comparing these two pianists. Yes shes good, but who are you to say she is better than horowitz?

  • @spreeville While I agree with you about her not being worse for being wrinkly, I think that having 60 plus years on their side would probably make them better.

    Not objectively of course, but it's just likely that since they've had more time to play that they'd be better.

    And of course I don't mean that she won't be better when she's older, because she's already extremely talented. She can only get better as long as she keeps playing.

  • Better than Horowitz? That would be going a bit far. However, this is a world apart from the best I ever heard from Ashkenazy, Lugansky or Berman. She has vastly better tone and cantabile than any of those performers.

  • You are amazing. I would love to hear you play Beethoven's "The Tempest" in its entirety. Would you ever consider playing that for an old friend? Not me! Some other old friend. You have old friends right? Do it for them.

  • i love the pose you took in the end haha. great performance!

  • I completely agree! However much I adore Horowitz' interpretations of Chopin and Liszt I think that the real fury and ENERGY recquired is truly owned by Ms. Astanova. She is incredible! She is so fiercely determined to make this music RELEVANT and that is the true purpose of the music. Without this fire, Rachmaninoff and the mystic Scriabin are impossible to really perform! It needs to scream it's message to the audience. Not sober indeed :)

  • Technically it is very good performance. But you played too loudly I think. It should be much much softer...

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  • I love your passion! wonderful! thank you!

  • Awesome Lola!

  • you are soooooo amazing:)))))

  • it's so beautiful, Lola... wonderful piece..

  • Gorgeous and talented. Very nice. Keep'em coming.

  • Long time no see! Great performance!

  • I think you should play at Bellagio. Las Vegas would adore you. You're perfect!

  • Your sensitivity to the texture and showmanship of this piece makes it an exciting and colorful listen. Wonderful.

    Also, nice earrings ;)

  • simplemente extraordinario.

  • Virtuosa

  • (..a real !Diva ..

  • I love it~

  • Brilliant

  • perfect *-* I can't even believe this is a study.

  • i'm sure you've never heard this before, but ur good.

  • Beautiful Lola

  • This is incredible!

  • hehe lil' virtuoso ^^