Christian Ihle Hadland, Wigmore Hall, review: A wonderfully rich repast

After two eloquent Brahms Rhapsodies, his finale was an arresting performance of Prokofiev’s second piano sonata

Nobody else has Christian Ihle Hadland's combination of poetry and pantherish power (Kim Laland)

The Norwegian pianist Christian Ihle Hadland looks like a genial and dishevelled Billy Bunter, but that impression is instantly dispelled when he puts his hands on the keyboard. Nobody else has his combination of poetry and pantherish power; he has a uniquely magic touch.

On this occasion he flung open the doors on a delightful variety of works, starting with something which might have seemed too hackneyed to bear yet more repetition - Bach’s Italian Concerto in F.

Yet it emerged pristine, with the ornamented lines of its opening Allegro given a pearlised springiness, and with the gracefully contrasting melodies of its Andante sounding sweetly thoughtful. Beethoven’s Sonata Opus 2 No 2, which followed, was full of discreet surprises; one might have said he took liberties with the score, had he not made the whole thing so convincingly feline. If this exuberant early work was suffused with coiled energy, Mendelssohn’s Variations serieuses allowed the release of that energy in a blaze of virtuosity.

After two eloquent Brahms Rhapsodies, Hadland’s finale was Prokofiev’s second piano sonata, and here too he found arrestingly new things to say. He denied us an encore, but this had already been a wonderfully rich repast.