Last night the RCM celebrated the 100th anniversary of Leonard Bernstein’s birth with a suitably themed concert at Koerner Hall.  The first half consisted of a performance of all the Anniversaries.  These are short piano pieces; only a minute or two long, that Bernstein composed late at night.  Each is dedicated to a friend or family member and many were reused later in longer works.  There are somewhere between 20 and 30 of them and last night they were played in sets of three, four or five with introductions before each set by the composer’s eldest daughter Jamie complete with photos etc.  The playing by Sebastian Knauer was idiomatic, virtuosic and sensitive.  The introductions were informative, engaging and mercifully short.  The music covered a vast range of moods and styles though all of it very Bernstein; that is to say tonal and obviously American.  I was particularly struck by the brooding piece he wrote for his younger daughter some years after the death of her mother and by the earlier piece, dedicated to his wife Felicia Montealegre, that had Copland all over it and was none the worse for that.  It was actually a rather brilliant way to showcase the man in a 45 minute or so concert segment.

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