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“Süddeutsche Zeitung”, 16th October 2002

Homero Francesch impresses with “Iberia” by Albéniz in Munich
If one had wanted to be wicked one could have said: Homero Francesch was unable to perform an encore during his piano concert at the Herkulessaal in Munich because he had already done nothing but perform encores for the entire evening. In actual fact these piano pieces with Hispanic rhythms by the Catalan composers, Issac Albéniz and Enrique Granados, have only rarely ever been performed in the regular programs of the concert pianists, as dictated by the canon or even as a complete cycle, in the century since they were composed, however the most effective of these have survived as encores; they have been misunderstood as exotic perfumed desserts, as tapas, and abused as savoury snacks after the final applause. Therefore it comes as nothing short of a minor sensation that a pianist should dare to perform Albéniz, and nothing other than Albéniz, in Munich and at that in the Herkulessaal, a venue that is today so rarely ever sold out.
Homero Francesch, who has long since evolved from the one-time youthful sensation, certainly chose to perform the most significant piano cycle by Albéniz in Munich, but in its complexity, also the most ‘cumbersome’ one. The twelve-part “Suite Iberia”, which Albéniz composed as one of his last pieces between 1905 and 1908 in France and which should, as is the case with the works of the other Catalan, Picasso, created in Paris during the same era, have the right to be appreciated as something unique of its own and not to only be misunderstood and dismissed as a piece for musical shenanigans in regional salons far away from the endeavours of the European Avantgarde.

Transparent Sounds

Homero Francesch, who is quite familiar with the achievements of French Impressionism, provided an insight to the twelve characters pieces that was so effective that it would have done a radiologist proud. In doing so he made a piece of colouristic modernity audible and visible, which goes far beyond the lowly folkloristic elements of the Iberian Genre. However not even Francesch was able to fully compensate the minor dramatic weaknesses that arise as a result of the sequence of the pieces. The similarities in the two last pieces are too identical; no matter how masterful the pianist differentiates them, a certain repetitive effect deprives the powerful closing pieces of their calculated effect and thus mutes the deserved triumph. This time it could hardly have been the fault of the performer: Francesch mastered the ridiculous discontinuities and the awkward interlocking and overlapping of the hands with great bravery and a delicacy of rhythms.
In the first piece, “Evocación”, Albéniz uses music to drift away from his exile in France to the dream of his homeland; in the second, “El puerto”, he has already plunged into the plump Iberian lifestyle. Francesch opened the kaleidoscope of scenes and songs with sensitively weighed gestures, almost scrupulous; it was almost with platitude that he allowed the varied piano means to evolve. The eerie Corpus Christi procession in the third piece, “El Corpus in Seville” rose to expressionistic greatness and archaic strangeness; the dance forms in the most famous piece, “ Triana”, passed by in crystal clarity.
How far Francesch has already drifted away from the compact piano playing style of the majority of his contemporaries became especially clear in the vital passages of “El Albaicín”: it was there that the bass melodies could perhaps have been a little more powerful at times; however where other pianists move monaurally and within the integral dynamics of the Late Romanesque, between the extremes, Francesch dissects, splits and grades the sounds, he discovers baffling modern nuances and shades, which bring this late piano masterpiece by Albéniz far into the 20th Century, but maybe also takes away a little of the possible direct effect in the concert hall.
Gottfried Knapp

“Berliner Morgenpost”, 15th August 2002

Homero Francesch: Always Effervescent with Culture
Until last night we had always thought that the great name was the best thing about Manuel de Falla’s, ‘Nights in Spanish Gardens’. How wrong we were, as Homero Francesch now proved at the “joung.euro.classic” Festival in the Konzerthaus at the Gendarmenmarkt with the magnificent Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival Orchestra conducted by Cristóbal Halffter. He performed his part on the piano with frenetic elegance. He succeeded in the most difficult: always effervescent with culture. Piano playing in the highest discant, tender thoughtfulness, whiplashes of the rhythms - Francesch incorporated all of these aspects into the sound of the orchestra without any musical self-interest. After all, De Falla’s piece is not a virtuoso concert, but rather, requires the unending consciousness of all those involved, for each other. The excellent orchestra surrounded the soloist with euphoric attentiveness. Gtl

“Wiesbadener Tagblatt”, 29th July 2002:
“The performance on the piano by Homero Francesch impressed through the song-like arrangement of the melody, with an elegance and lightness. Francesch applied a relishing, self-quiescent slowness to the solos of Mozart’s first independent Piano Concerto in D Major KV 175. In the finale his trills sparkled wonderfully on the sounds of the London Mozart Players. A soft and at the same time feminine sound also marked his performance on the piano of the Concerto in A Major KV 414, which changed step and glided delightfully.”