San Francisco Classical Voice

Bay Area audiences have already seen and heard something of Hilary Hahn, the barely-out-of-her-teens violinist who was signed by Sony at 15 or so and has been causing jaws to drop from coast to coast ever since. But apart from the lucky few who caught a spring recital of the three Brahms sonatas in Saratoga, we have had to content ourselves with concerto performances, and merely imagine how Hahn would handle the sonata repertory. Not any more; Sunday's recital at Herbst Theater told all that we need to know-"keep listening."

There is something perilous in attaining such complete mastery so young. What to do with all that power? So easy merely to coast on it; so tempting, on the other hand, to strike out with it in self-consciously new directions, to set oneself apart for the sake of difference. They are both deadly roads, and there's a point past which most listeners will cease to care which has been taken, the path of bland "perfection" or the path of single-minded "originality."

On the evidence of Sunday's recital, Hahn has avoided both traps. The implacable, steamroller-esque quality of her Bay Area concerto performances was gone (whether because she has grown out of it or because she takes a different tack in chamber music, it's impossible to know). Not that she lacked power, naturally; I doubt that any violinist alive could surpass her in sheer strength and keenness of tone. But she used her full-force sound as one resource among many, not as an all-purpose bludgeon.

And while Hahn allowed herself a fair amount of rhythmic and dynamic freedom in the two Brahms sonatas on her program, she avoided virtuosic manipulations of either time or dynamic that would call attention to themselves. She seemed, indeed, to be trying deliberately not to make "effects," but instead to keep the music on a single, extended trajectory.

The Brahms sonatas were the first (G-major, Op. 78) and third (D-minor, Op. 108). Anyone who has ever heard Hahn play anything could have predicted a terrific performance of the Third, which is very much up her alley-dark, intense, furious, and full of inner tension even when (as in the slow movement) it seems to relax into lyricism.

And so it was. The slow movement, in particular, was awesome. There are not many violinists with such a secure hold on the upper reaches of the G string, nor with such solid double-stopping. But why talk technique? The seductive unfolding of the slow movement's theme on the G string, the coy playing with articulation in the scherzo that follows it-these are, of course, technical effects, but in Hahn's performance it became difficult to think about them in technical terms.

That the first Brahms sonata got every bit as good a performance is more surprising, and encouraging. This much gentler and more delicate piece would not seem to be her stuff, but Hahn thinned down her tone and softened her attack. The result was about the best Brahms G-major sonata I have heard live. The first movement's one pesky hurdle-how to get into the recapitulation without making a fool of oneself-she cleared with ease; and she handled the finale's recap of the slow movement with equal dexterity. But what drove everything was her innocent lyricism. Hahn plays Brahms as though she has nothing else to do but sing.

Mozart's F-major Sonata, K. 377, was a little messier; if only because Hahn's full-throated lyricism sat uneasily in this smaller-scaled piece. Bach's G-minor solo sonata was something else. Hahn's debut recording, a mere three-and-a-half years ago, was of solo Bach. Comparing those performances and this one made clear just how far Hahn has traveled in the intervening time. The debut record is immaculate, but simultaneously brutal (with its slashing chords) and a little faceless.

Sunday's solo Bach (Hahn has not so far recorded this piece) was gentler and more subtly inflected, and full of the kind of nuance that was missing from the recording. Hahn's delicacy in this of all pieces was a marvel. The Fuga is almost an invitation to violinistic violence, and it is a rare player who can settle down, as she did, to a tranquil reading of the Siciliana afterwards. The Presto was just as it should be, a deluge of notes, yet controlled.

(Michelle Dulak is a violinist and violist who has written about music for "Strings," "Stagebill," "Early Music America" and The New York Times.)

©2000 Michelle Dulak, all rights reserved