Ewa Poblocka (piano)

NCH, Dublin

Field– Nocturnes Nos 6, 1, 10. Chopin– Nocturne in E flat Op 55 No 2. Sonata No 3. Ballade No 1. Mazurkas Op 41. Scherzo No 1. Nocturnes in F minor Op 55 No 1; in C sharp minor Op 27 No 2.

POLISH PIANIST Ewa Poblocka is regarded as something of a musical ambassador in her native Poland. She visited Ireland as the soloist with two Polish orchestras in the last 10 years, and in 1999 she gave a John Field Room recital commemorating the 150th anniversary of Chopin’s death, when she preceded Chopin with nocturnes by John Field.

She adopted the same approach at the National Concert Hall on Thursday, in a recital presented by the Polish embassy, the NCH and the Ireland-Poland Cultural Foundation to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Chopin’s birth.

It’s an approach that is not very kind to Field. His slender talent does not stand up well beside the genius of Chopin, especially in performances that treat his nocturnes, as Poblocka did, from what you might call a Chopinesque perspective. The upside is that of making Field seem prescient, of having, as it were, built in suggestions of what was to come in Chopin. But the pieces are actually more effective when taken on their own terms.

Poblocka is not the most subtle of Chopin interpreters. Her general approach on Thursday was direct and unfussy, sometimes almost brusque, as if a direct statement should be enough to ignite her listeners’ awareness of the poetry of the music. She was capable of considerable power, delighting at times in the growling thunder of left-hand octave passages, and sometimes retreating into attractive havens of caressing reverie. It was the middle ground that was problematic. Too often there were passages where her matter of factness produced playing that while idiomatic, was also somehow prosaic.

The best moments came in the more intimate moments of her final pair of nocturnes, but most of all in the deftly sprung responsiveness she showed to the four mazurkas of Op. 41. Here, everything gelled to perfection.