Hearing all his piano concertos renders an image of Beethoven.

Byline: Fred Crafts The Register-Guard

Playing just one of Ludwig van Beethoven's five virtuosic piano concertos on a single program is enough for most pianists. But Jeffery Kahane is up to doing all five concertos in two Oregon Bach Festival programs.

"It's not a stunt, but it may appear that way," Kahane said by phone from his home in Santa Rosa, Calif. "There is something very deep and powerful that comes from listening to and performing a complete group of works in proximity.

"It allows you to hear the connections between the works and to hear the growth from one to another."

A piano prodigy, Beethoven was only 25 when he wrote his first piano concerto (Concerto No. 2 - the first and second concertos were published in reverse order).

As soon as he was done, he started the second concerto (Piano Concerto No. 1). Then five years passed before he got around to the third.

By the time Beethoven completed Piano Concerto No. 4, he was 36 years old and was beginning to lose his hearing. When he wrote Piano Concerto No. 5 - three years later in 1809 - he was almost totally deaf.

Although he abandoned the piano concerto form, he went on to write nine symphonies and countless other works.

Although the concertos are favorites with pianists and audiences alike, they are usually performed singly, nestled among other works.

Kahane has twice before played all five in two concerts - with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and the Santa Rosa Symphony. This season, he will do them only in Eugene - on Tuesday and Thursday - and in Los Angeles at the Hollywood Bowl on Aug. 12 and 14.

Adding to the pressure of being the performer, Kahane also conducts the orchestra from the piano bench.

"It's emotionally and psychologically very taxing for the performer, as well as being just a physical workout. It's a marathon," Kahane said. ``It's not something I would want to do 10 times a year. But twice a year, I can do it.''

No one is looking forward to hearing Kahane's interpretations more than the festival's artistic director, Helmuth Rilling.

"When do you hear that?" he asked. "Which pianist can do this in such a short time? One concerto alone is already enough, but this (doing all five in two programs) is great."

Another festival pianist, Robert Levin, called Kahane's feat "heroic" and "an extraordinary luxuriance of very great piano and orchestral music. I'm sure, on a pianistic level, what Jeff offers will be stellar, because it always is."

A favorite of Oregon Bach Festival audiences, Kahane brings plenty of experience to the project.

He won the the 1983 Rubinstein Competition and was a finalist at the 1981 Van Cliburn Competition. Besides winning numerous awards, he has performed with the New York and Los Angeles Philharmonics, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the San Francisco Symphony, the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic, the Rotterdam Philharmonic, the Israel Philharmonic and the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields.

Kahane also has toured in duo recitals with cellist Yo-Yo Ma, soprano Dawn Upshaw and violinist Joshua Bell. As a conductor, Kahane is music director of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and the Santa Rosa Symphony and is the artistic director of the recently founded Green Music Festival in Sonoma County, Calif. Beethoven is a particular favorite of Kahane. He played the third concerto in public when he was just 16.

"I've lost count of how many times I've played the fourth concerto," he said.

For the audience member, Kahane believes hearing all five concertos in a cycle is a rare opportunity to "listen to the growth and development of one of the greatest composers who ever lived."

The first and second concertos are the product of a young composer, but the third concerto is the work Kahane believes "opens the gateway into the middle period where you see this extraordinary deepening of the personality. Then we turn to the fourth, which is one of the most sublime and profound works in the entire literature, then ending up with the `Emperor.' '

But Kahane notes that the picture of Beethoven that emerges from the piano concertos, which he stopped writing in the middle period of his life, is not as complete as the one gotten from his string quartets or piano sonatas, which he wrote all his life.

"Audiences, in the two times I've done it, have just found it a thrilling experience to hear these five pieces.

``Even people who came in skeptically, saying, `I'm not sure I want to hear five concerti by Beethoven in two evenings' came away saying, `Wow, what an amazing experience to hear these five radically different pieces of music.'

"If you're willing to surrender to the fact that this is sort of a monumental undertaking both for the performer and the listener, it's just fantastic - a great experience."

Fred Crafts can be reached at 338-2575 or fcrafts@guardnet. com.

CONCERT PREVIEW

Beethoven piano concertos

What: Ludwig van Beethoven's piano concertos 2, 3 and 4 (Tuesday) and 1 and 5 (Thursday) performed by Jeffrey Kahane and the festival orchestra

When: 8 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday

Where: Silva Concert Hall, Hult Center, Seventh Avenue and Willamette Street

How much: $27, $39 and $49 per evening, through the Hult Center box office (682-5000)