What a goddess! She looks ready to cry but somehow pulls herself together and dives right in. And the D minor concerto is an absolute beast even if you *are* expecting to play it... I would have died right there onstage. How did they manage to cross so many wires as to not let her know what concerto they were doing, even if they had rehearsed three different ones before? Thank heaven it was one she knew really well! Respect, Maria Joao...major respect.

The best thing about this is Chailly - no panic, keeps on beating for the orchestra, but encourages her superbly and gives her the confidence to play it. Brilliant directorship.

I feel deepest respect and admiration for Maria Joao Pires. I know her personnaly and I understand, why she did this. This is her respect for the music, the audiance and the orchestra. She is an extremely honest und fantastic artist.

It is quite idiotic to think it was planned. No, miscommunication between agents and orchestra managers happen. Many divas/divos would have left the stage and/or refused to play. She showed humility, courage and tremendous talent. She is a truly remarkable artist. Bravo!

A very good example that if you calm yourself and just turn inward, all the things you've learned and know are in there. Panic shuts you down, calmness allows the flow. Brava

It happened 15 years ago, but I was still freaking out for her during the entire video. What a genius. I would have loved to hear it all.

Some explanation found online which makes it much more sensible now: "They (Maria João, conductor, and orchestra) had recorded 6 months earlier three Mozart concerti. This lunch concert was the rehearsal for the evening performance. Since they had rehearsed to prepare the recording six months earlier, this lunch concert was the only rehearsal. She came prepared to play K. 467 and was caught off guard by K. 466 ( although it has been in her repertory for years)."

Wow, the moment she started playing I teared up so much. Unexpected. But such amazing respect to great talent in the face of fear and doubt.

Utterly amazing. What must have gone on in her mind? From despair to resolve, playing a concerto with nothing to hold on to except your own memory and the support of the conductor. What a great artist!

This Shows Everybody That She´s Still One Of The Best Classic Piano Players...Being An Honest And Simple Professional Deserving All Our Admiration And Respect !...

I think the thing about it is that she knew both pieces, but classical music isn't exactly known to be easy, short, or simply written, so freshening up on a concerto some time prior is needed; that is why it's a feat to play perfectly regardless of practicing the wrong piece.

To all of you skeptics - just listen to her planned recorded version: the stark difference between the two performances testifies for the fact the those first moments when she enters with her part were literally recreated from a different place in her memory. The her touch, the tempo, timber are all different than her CD. When she plays the first few bars here, it is almost as she is not sure what comes next - which is probably the perfect way to play and listen to music.

Holy crap. Maria is amazing. Even though she rehearsed a completely different concerto, she still played this concerto as if she rehearsed this one. amazing.

Only a GREAT performer would be able to do this!FANTASTIC.BRAVO!

why isn't the rest of this on youtube? this is incredible...and i like the orchestra's aggressive taken of the introduction

I was so nervous for her... cried once she began! So lovely... genius at work.

amen. i sent this to my daughter who is just emerging onto a world stage with the message - never give up. never give up! superfluous for her as she never surrenders.

That piano entrance though...

She's amazing :) There are only a few musicians that could do what Maria João Pires did. Wonderful!! Let's not forget to thanks to the conductor who helped Maria calm down :)

Truly inspiring on so many levels. Thank you Maria for showing us all how to overcome adversity and rise to the occasion. There is so much more to strive for than just what's expected. Thank you.

Why did that make me cry when she succeeds at the end? Maybe because she took a leap of faith - I think there’s a lesson in there.

Oh my gosh, my heart was racing with anxiety for her! Ugh, that was a close one that resonates with me all too well.

Contrary to "PR stunt" theory I am practically certain that was legitimate. 1. Even if it was reherseal, it would be unprofessional to put a stunt like this. 2. They had nothing to gain by this stunt". 3. Pianist have exquisite memory for music. 4. Maria Pires is a very experienced pianist, she must have played this "other" Mozart concerto multiple times, hence she was able to bring it back to her memory. 5. She does look panicked trying to remember what comes next even when she started playing - if she faked it that puts Meryl Streep's acting to shame :)

I get the feeling that director imagines that, of course, she can play any concerto. He has appropriately placed confidence in her.

Spontaneous performance of unexpected piece revealed her actual beauty of understanding how it should be performed. ..

There are good reasons for tears watching this miracle. It is not about "extra good working memory and professionalism" etc. etc. ... but for beeing encountered with the pure, human mystery.

I , as a professionnal musician, personnally think this is a sad part of the job. No budget=no reps.... so much pressure on the artist who are expected to perform as if everything has been taken care of... so much expectations from the audience and "backstage" staff... tough job being an artist and making the dream come through... Bravo to all of you who make little miracles happen unnoticed every single day!

really amazing memory and exquisite playing

this is what a true PRO is all about!

The acting analogy is a ridiculous one: she did not forget her lines; a different play was being staged to the one she turned up for. How many actors could have remembered the dialogue for a part he or she was not expecting to play? She was magnificent.

The final (and sometimes only) rehearsal in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw is often 'disguised' as an informal Lunch Concert. So yes, indeed, they didn't rehearse before.

My favourite classical pianist, she is the absolute best. So proud that she's portuguese!

And yet it sounded soooo beautiful... What an enormous artist!!

Simply amazing!!

What happened on this stage restores faith in mankind. Empathy, team work, man-woman equality, and power of the brain... I'm watching this each time I'm feeling down!

Fantastic! What a professional!

This is so amazing and no words can describe! What an inspiration!!

What an extraordinary musician...total respect but the stuff of nightmares!

just increadible! chapeau to Maria Joao Pires

Que valentía, y que profesionalismo, una verdadera joya, admirable

Its been years since I first saw this video, and I still keep coming back to it. As a piano player, this woman is still one of my absolute heroes! I am pretty decent at memorizing songs, but the fact that she was essentially hung out to dry with the wrong music (a mistake but god damn!), in a concert setting this serious, is horrifying to me. It takes a HELL of a person to recover from that, and then go on to play the song perfectly from memory. I bet alot of us would have been literally vomiting from the dread of that dramatic piano entrance coming up with no music... Edit: 3:23 still gives me crazy chills all of these years later

I don't know why, but this actually moved me to tears

Thanks for the information ! it's incredible that she could still play it

In our Age of Mediocrity, it is sad that many people can't recognize greatness when faced with it. To rememer the whole concert, as the conductor says she did, would have been remarkable. To still play it beautifully, as it can be derived from the first bars on the video, is almost superhuman. No, this clearly is not fake nor a publicity stunt. This is a moment of pure beauty. Enjoy it, it doesn't happen that often!

Change to a different concerto within minutes on stage and play it perfectly! I adore her so muchhhhh!

Maria Joao Pires you are brilliant!!!!

The mindset of a true talent...

Every pianist fear, im in high school and have to play a concert for the class. This gave me goosebumps.

THANK YOU! I was hoping someone would have posted it :)

Bravo! What makes greatness.

I love to see the conductor shine, leading the musicians.

Thank you for your response. Anyway, your video is valuable as it shows unforgettable moment.

Didn't you get the email?

She's my absolute hero. What a great artist.

this is so beautiful

Me emociono cada vez que lo veo, imposible empatizar con esa situación. Maria Joao una genia total.

She could make it because the maestro believed in her. What a lesson for our managers!

Woow, amazingly done!

Esta mulher é absolutamente genial!

This moved me to tears

This is pure magic!

I heard this story about Slava Rostropovich expecting to play Dvořák cello concerto, yes, the one with few minutes of orchestral intro in the beginnig... So he sits there, relaxed, waiting for his entrace and the orchestra starts - with the Saint-Saëns concerto - the one where cello starts at the second beat in the first bar! Can you imagine the shock and literally no time to prepare anything to play?

regardless of whatever theories there might be about this "incident" - i really would LOVE to hear the complete performance of THIS version.....anyone have it ? please...

Reading about nervus vagus brought me here. Amazing!

Pires entry in the Mozart is exquisite: Beautifully phrased. Even more phenomenal is the story I heard on the radio of John Ogden turning up at a concert to play and checking with the conductor in the artist room just before going out on stage whether they were playing the Brahms First or Second! Barenboim too has a phenomenal gift to memorise.His memory is photographic. There are great musicians and then there are those whose minds operate beyond most people's ability to comprehend.

Brilliant pianist! I wanted to hear the rest of the song!

There are public rehearsals at times :-) It's a great way to prepare for other aspects of performance that closed door rehearsals can't...plus a great way to build a relationship between orchestra and audience. But I think you are right about the Lunchtime concert thing ^_^ And yes, she was amazing...and that conductor knows how to help bring out confidence...definitely good leadership things we can learn from him, too!

Wow! Fantastic!

What a legend, talk about staring at the abyss and jumping right in

I feel scared just looking at the horror and the despair on her face. its just impossible to imagine.. What a legend

👀 Astonishing 👏🏻👏🏻

Even if it wasn't true story, these extraordinary musicians are capable of such tasks, which IS amazing.

Ahh brilliantly done lady!

¡Fantástica Maria Joao Pires! Es una maravilla de pianista, parece que fuera hecha toda de música.

How terrifying! I probably would've had a complete mental breakdown if this happened to me. The fact that she was able to recover her senses and try to remember, is incredible. And the fact that she Did remember, and remembered it perfectly, is Really incredible. Good for her, I say. Good for her.

That is incredible!

Simplesmente extraordinário...Uma verdadeira pianista

Que coragem... e que memória!!!

wow that was amazingly beautiful...What a talent...I would have choked for sure!

Is there a full version of this concert on video somewhere?

Exactly. You can consider yourself extremely lucky if you get 2 rehearsals prior to a concert. And considering how tough Mozart is on the keyboard (studied piano for 9 years before realizing that I didn't have the "memory" retention capabilities to hack it as a concert pianist) to be able to switch like that...is testament to her memory and flexibility as a concert pianist.

Totally unbelievable !!!

this is PURE TALENT!! I bet she hadn't played this song for a few months.......

Amazing.

A pianist like Maria Joao Pires doesn't need to fake a mistake in an open rehearsal to help her career, nor did she need the 681,000 views on a website that had yet to be invented.

Wow ! A true professional.

Maria João: YOU are absolutely the GREATEST! :-)

fantastique!

At about two and a half minutes in she looks profoundly unhappy. Her anxiety is palpable but she was amazing.

Seeing many comments here, a few words that I wanted to say: no wonder about the genius and incredible memory capacities of her, and I am pretty sure she is aware of it. the point, I think, why she looks devastated is the ideas and connection to the piece, the colours, the touch. Even when you know a piece since years, if you did not practice a piece intensively recently (even thinking about it helps, but mental practice is also practice) before a performance, it becomes a battle of survival. And that is the thing I think, here she fights like a queen, but I can see that she would have wanted not to fight to survive, instead, interpret the piece, sing her soul out loud, and make piano sing. And that’s the difference.

Remarkable! :o Brava!!

I'm a jazz pianist (hobbyist, more than anything), but I have a degree in classical piano performance, and let me tell you that virtually all of the top jazz pianists that I've talked to or listened to or heard of are talented, often accomplished classical pianists. Along the same lines as your comment, but I've also heard from these musicians that jazz is every bit as demanding technically as classical music, but it requires a different mindset; jazz is in the moment, classical is in the prep.

it's like turning up for a school exam, having revised the wrong topic... and panicking oh ****... and then still pulling it off. ^_^ Bravo MJP

BRAVISSIMO !! ELA É GENIAL !!!

She's great !

..PIRES is my go-to Artist for Mozart, especially after this incident.. only a Twin Flame of Mozart could have pulled off what she did.. and every time.. throughout the years.. Better and Better (Remarkable as each time is already the Epitome of Mozart's Art...) We are Blessed to have experienced Pires...!!!

ClassicFM in the UK posted this on their website, in case you wondered where all the hits where coming from: www.classicfm.com/artists/maria-joao-pires/guides/wrong-piano-concerto/

unbelievable...

Essa mulher é espetacular!

Nailed it!