Credit: Andrej Grilc & Helge Kruckeberg
It’s all in the musical family for Maria Ioudenitch, as her father Stanislav Ioudenitch won gold at the XI Van Cliburn International Piano Competition and is on the faculty of Oberlin Conservatory and Park University’s International Center for Music, while mother Tatiana is founder of Young Artists Music Academy in Kansas City. Maria Ioudenitch was born in Russia, raised in Kansas City since the age of three and received master’s and bachelor’s degrees from New England Conservatory of Music and Curtis Institute of Music. She is currently coaching with Christian Tetzlaff in Germany and comments, “It’s been a dream working with Christian and although we’ve only worked together a handful of times, I treasure them all the same.” She comments that so far the coaching repertoire has included concertos of Tchaikovsky, Shostakovich and plans to play for him Mendelssohn and Beethoven concertos. “From what I’ve experienced so far, I can imagine those coachings will be full of absolute attention and humility to the score and its markings, while trying to exceed one’s own possibilities of imagination and emotion.”
In 2021, Maria Ioudenitch became a musical Triple Crown winner with first prize finishes at the Joseph Joachim, Ysaӱe and Tibor Varga International violin and music competitions. Her career was launched and subsequent appearances in the United States and Europe include tours with Ravinia Steans Music Institute, Marlboro Music Festival and an upcoming recital on March 3 at La Jolla Music Society in an intriguing program that will include violin sonatas of Ravel and Brahms. A father-daughter collaboration is also in the works. “This is our first season performing full recitals together and we have two confirmed, with more on the way. Our program will be all French music in Ravel, Poulenc, Franck and Lili and Nadia Boulanger – something we both have a particular fondness for,” she says.
Ioudenitch released the debut CD Songbird that contains some works that are refreshingly underperformed (Warner Classics, 2023). But her programs often include overlooked repertoire by composers like William Grant Still, Fazil Say, Barber, Medtner and Glazunov. Ioudenitch explains why the music of these bygone Russian composers is still relevant, although not a part of mainstream recitals. “Glazunov and Medtner, the latter of whom was a big hit at the turn of the 20th century, especially in Russia are brilliant composers in their own right. But they both fell out of fashion as the century progressed, precisely because they were deemed old-fashioned.”
She observes how programming has evolved from its 19th century performer oriented roots to present. “I think at that time when both Medtner and Glazunov were hits, artists built their programs with an intention for entertainment. You had recital programs not just of three Brahms sonatas but concertos with piano, a succession of show pieces and little encore gems sprinkled through the second half. Entertainment is not used negatively here but as a way to bring joy to an audience. I think nowadays we’ve lost that, generalized of course. We are very much focused on the intellectual, the adherence to precise notation and composers’ intent, etc. Let it be known that I propose a combination of the two, not a full reversal.” Programming takes on a special significance for artists like Ioudenitch looking to find the right balancing act between familiar and lesser-known repertoire worthy of performing or recording.
It takes courage to treat an audience to awesome yet unfamiliar pieces. Vladimir Horowitz sustained a career from these types of goodies and Michael Tilson Thomas still builds programs around composers of our time. “Glazunov was very much an entertainer. His melodies are glorious, harmonies lush, and maybe it might not move mountains and souls like a Brahms symphony, but does everything have to? Even if Glazunov wasn’t an innovator in the grand scheme of music history and composition, his work has merit in that it brings beauty. Why not play it? And even though Medtner was also called old-fashioned, take a listen, especially to his piano works. Sometimes I feel I’ve never heard a progression or voice leading like the way Medtner does it. There’s always something to be discovered as the years pass and generations change.”
And there is much to be discovered in the playing of Maria Ioudenitch.