Saal der Singakademie (November 18, 1889)

Carreño performed with the Berlin Philharmonic under conductor Gustav F. Kogel. She performed Piano Concerto in A minor, op. 16 (Grieg, Edvard) and Polonaise brillante op. 72 (Weber-Liszt). The concert began at 7:30 pm. She performed on a Bechstein piano. Ticket prices were 5, 3, and 2 Marks.

Review: Neue Berliner Musikzeitung 43, no. 48, 28 November 1889, 393.

Review: Chicago Daily Tribune, 22 December 1889, 27.

Concert Program: US-POtc: Folder 14.11 Concert Programs

Kijas, Anna

Chicago Daily Tribune, December 22, 1889.

The New York Musical Courier quotes the following from the pen of the well-known Berlin critic, Otto Lessman, which will be read with interest by the many friends and admirers of Mme. Carreño:

“The American pianist, Teresa Carreño, who gave a concert with orchestra in the Singakademie Nov. 18, may pride herself on having had a great, overpowering success. I have not heard for a long time a pianist who has so fascinated me as Mme. Carreño. Here is for once an independent personality among the many mediocre figures who people the great highway of customary pianism. With a perfect, dazzling technical dexterity, a strength which would be sufficient for two pianists, and an uncommonly strongly marked feeling for rhythm, Mme. Carreño combines a mental freedom and independence of comprehension which raise her far above the region of mere pianists into the realm of true art. Everything about this lady's performance is carried out on a grand scale, and on that account I imagine that many a listener may be repelled by the power of this presence, which has nothing feminine about it, but at the same time also nothing unbeautiful or unnatural. Mme. Carreño compares with pianists of ordinary caliber just as a "Brünhilde" would with a well brought up "bread and butter miss" of our time, and if this divine Wish-maiden stirs comfortable Philistinism into something of a tumult by the overpowering fire of her passion, the cry of distress from endangered decorum may be quite in order, but it will do no harm to the conquering and artistic abandon of her powerful nature.

"I do not doubt that the critical plummet will sound inequalities in many respects, but I openly confess that it is impossible for me to weigh with the coolness of a scientist the for and against in reference to particular tempos or a possible excess in strength, under the spell of the brilliant renderings which Mme. Carreño gave to the Grieg A minor Concerto, the etudes symphoniques of Schumann and E major polonaise of Weber, arranged by Liszt.”

Carreño, by reason of her great successes in Germany, has been compelled to cancel her Paris dates.

Neue Berliner Musikzeitung 43, no. 48, November 28, 1889.

Eine neue pianistische Erscheinung für Deutschland war Frau Teresa Carreño. Die warmblütige venezuelische Künstlerin spielt das Grieg'sche A-moll-Concert, Schumann's sinfonische Etuden und Weber-Liszt's Polonaise und zeigte sich, was zunächst ihre Technik anlangt, als eine Spielerin ersten Ranges. Die schwierigsten Sachen aller Art gelangen wunderbar, kein einziger Griff ging daneben. Dabei war der Ton förmlich kraftstrotzend und die Energie des bestimmten Anschlags, selbst unter so schwierigen Verhältnissen, wie in den vollen Akkorden des Schumann'schen Finales, bewundernswert. Auch an Temperament fehlt es Frau Carreño wahrhaftig nicht, und sein Ausdruck hat etwas ganz Eigenartiges, Wild-schönes. Das Weiche, Innige, Sinnige muss man nun allerdings in dem Spiel der interessanten Südamerikanerin nicht suchen; und gewiss nicht, was uns in solcher Art als specifisch weiblich erscheint. Nicht, dass Frau Carreño's Vortrag einen unweiblichen Eindruck machte; aber ihr ganzes Musiciren ist so starkgeistig wie tonkräftig, und es fehlen ihr selbst diejenigen weicheren Farben, die wir auch beim Manne nicht gern vermissen. Ihre Freude an der Tonmasse, die sie doch in tadelloser Klarheit zu gestalten weiss, scheint unbegrenzt: und obgleich sie eigentlich wenig Kontraste im Spiele zur Verfügung hat, so hält sie das Interesse des Hörers doch ununterbrochen fest.