Having heroes is always interesting, particularly when you're young, writes Eileen Battersby. That's when anything is possible and usually makes perfect sense.
Why wouldn't a world-class tennis player also happen to be one of the great pianists? After all, when I was small I planned on being a show-jumper, a violinist, a ballerina and a vet as well as an Olympic 400-metre runner, leaving sufficient time to read lots of books, design several houses and ride across Siberia.
So there seemed no logical reason to suspect that the tennis player Ion Tiriac and the pianist Radu Lupu, both dark and swarthy (now both are much greyer), both sporting heavy bandito-type moustaches, both not overly given to grinning, were not one and the same person. After all, both were Romanians, and I didn't know of any others, apart from Tiriac's fellow tennis virtuoso, Ilie Nastase.
Eventually I grew up and realised that Radu Lupu was not a tennis player, and may never have held a racquet, but as a pianist he is a supreme artist in possession of iron technique, subtle playfulness and a beautiful sound. His recital next Thursday at the National Concert Hall in Dublin, playing Beethoven, Berg and his beloved Schubert, should be one of the great arts events of the year.
Lupu, now a couple of days past his 59th birthday, was born in Galati,Romania in 1945. He made his debut at the age of 12, playing his own compositions, and for a time it seemed he wanted to be a composer. Luckily for the world of music, he was drawn increasing to playing the work of Beethoven, Schumann, Brahms and, most wonderfully of all, Schubert, whose Sonata in G major features in Thursday's programme which also includes Beethoven's 32 Variations in C minor. The great earlier Austro-Germans, Haydn and Mozart, have always been important to Lupu, a pianistic colourist whose art balances classical discipline with romantic versatility.
Having begun his music studies as a six-year-old in Romania, he studied at the Moscow Conservatoire under Heinrich Neuhaus, who had taught Sviatoslav Richter. While still a student in Russia, Lupu won major competitions such as the 1966 Van Cliburn, 1967 Enescu and 1969 Leeds competitions. These are achievements that make a career. Yet Lupu was sufficiently detached to continue viewing himself as an apprentice of the piano and a servant of the music he played. He has remained that gracious servant. An element of drama, almost theatricality, surrounds him on stage. He sits back, uses a chair not a stool, and moves as if in a trance. His performances are passionate, emotional and highly expressive. Yet he is no showman, refuses interviews, and keeps his distance from the public, though he is known for his humour.
He has made a selective body of recordings, mostly either solo or chamber, with some notable partners such as Murray Perahia and Daniel Barenboim. He won a Grammy in 1995 for his recording of Schubert's sonatas in A major and B flat, and has recorded the Beethoven piano concertos, as well as Brahms's No 1 and several Mozart concertos, but he has become disillusioned with the recording process, which he feels sanitises performances.
His response to music goes beyond his skill at the keyboard; there is an emotional and intellectual engagement. Lupu is a musician who has listened well to the works he plays. In addition to the feeling, is the sense of deep thought and wit. The Irish pianist John O'Conor nominates Radu Lupu as the living pianist he most admires, and is flying back from London on Thursday for the recital. "His playing is not just a pianistic experience, it is musical, emotional and spiritual. He has colour, imagination and inspiration."
It is always interesting to experience what a particular artist brings to a well-known piece. Beethoven's piano sonata in C sharp minor, Opus 27/2, better known as "the Moonlight Sonata" is long established as a concert and recording favourite, thanks to its slow, Chopin-like opening, its pretty dance-like second movement and a forceful finale of physical power. But it is also a piece that has often been played badly, even by good pianists. It is as if it encourages musicians either to try something different, or else not try hard enough.
In 2001, BBC Music Magazine compiled a survey of 100 recordings, ranging from Artur Schnabel in 1933 to Evgeny Kissin (1997) and Louis Lortie's (1999), and including most of the modern masters, such as Artur Rubinstein, Alfred Brendel, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Maurizio Pollini, Glenn Gould and Daniel Barenboim. Far and away the best performance was judged to be Lupu's, which was praised as having found a way of uniting the contrasting natures of the three movements. Played in the grand manner for which he is famous, his haunting, romantic interpretation was deemed to possess "a dark, tragic vision".
A performer of presence, the pianist as poet takes the National Concert Hall stage next Thursday. So what if he never played tennis?