Ivory keys surrounded Hayato Sumino at Stanford University’s Bing Concert Hall: two Steinways (one grand, one upright), a Prophet synthesizer, and a toy piano the color of the hall’s stage.
Sumino’s delightfully eclectic multi-piano performance drew a sold-out crowd on Monday evening and, as indicated by several standing ovations, they surely went home glad to have spent the first night of the work week enjoying Sumino’s second U.S. concert this year.
Throughout the night, Sumino stunned and charmed with his playing as well as his own compositions. He brought Bach’s Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue in D Minor to life, mesmerizing the audience with technical showmanship and continued with rousing renditions of Chopin’s Nocturne in C Minor, Op. 48, No. 1 and Scherzo No. 1 in B Minor, Op. 20. While a few flourishes begged for more precision and clarity, Sumino’s delivery of these pieces was an impressive show of his endurance and vibrant expressiveness.
Departing from standard fare, Sumino embarked on an epic and imposing journey time with Hans Zimmer’s three-and-a-half-minute “Day One,” from the soundtrack of Interstellar (2014). The piece’s multilayered accompaniment kept Sumino busy on the synthesizer while he perfectly delivered Zimmer’s haunting melody on the piano.
The highlight of the first half, though, was Sumino’s presentation of Maurice Ravel’s Jeux d’eau, celebrating the French composer’s 150th anniversary. As if inviting the audience to reach out toward the stage and feel the cool wetness, the pianist wonderfully balanced the piece’s playfulness and enchanting power.
Sumino’s creativity shone through in his own compositions. Three Nocturnes offered a much-needed reflective moment after Ravel’s work. But the opener of the second half, Sumino’s adorable Big Cat Waltz — his take on a waltz-scherzo — was the strongest item in his portfolio. The bouncy, joyful rhythms careened like the lovable feline as the musician switched between the grand Steinway and the tiny toy piano. It was a triumphant peak for the evening.
Sumino’s creativity and musical wit were on display, particularly in his own 20-minute arrangement of Gershwin’s An American in Paris. While muddled at times, his take was fresh and engaging with vibrant improvisations and references to other Gershwin masterpieces like Rhapsody in Blue.
Closing with Ravel’s Boléro, Sumino established the piece’s hallmark rhythm with a synth loop and then swung around his enclosure of pianos, playing the two Steinways at once. At one point, he had to reached behind himself to play on the synthesizer again.
The surrounding enclosure of various keyboards made the performance exciting and charmingly unpredictable. While at points he might have had less trouble maintaining rhythmic clarity if he had stuck to one piano, for others the ivory smorgasbord was crucial — it felt like we had the privilege of watching an artist at work in his own studio.
At the risk of coming off as gimmicky, Sumino’s concert proved that showmanship can pay artistic dividends, heightening the diversity of timbres available in a normal recital. If you’re ready to be charmed, delighted, and impressed overall by the skill that binds it all together, Hayato Sumino offers a wonderful evening that should not be missed.
