Wagner Fulfills Pops Audience’s Exceptations Longtime Spokane Favorite, Pianist Richard Wagner, Brought His Dazzling Style To The Opera House Saturday Night.

Walt Wagner’s first name is incorrect in the headline and caption.

Spokane Symphony pops with Walt Wagner Saturday, March 11, at the Opera House

When an audience comes to a symphony pops program, it’s the pops they want to hear. They intended no offense, I’m sure, but Saturday’s near-capacity Opera House audience seemed patiently polite through a short Spokane Symphony set.

They were waiting for pianist Walt Wagner, a Spokane favorite since he first began appearing in lounges here in the late 1960s. The classically trained Wagner, together with bassist Clipper Anderson and drummer Michael Buono, rewarded his listeners with a solid hour-and-a-half of playing that alternated the energy of a barn dance with ballad-style dreaminess.

Wagner’s style is a dazzling combination of ingredients from the melodic filigree of Chopin to the hard-driving stride of Fats Waller into the dense harmonies of Ellington and beyond. There are few techniques in piano playing Wagner has not managed to adapt. In “Boiling Heart,” there was the thrust of Prokofiev’s pile-driving repeated notes. Wagner can employ breathtakingly long passages of rapid alternate-hand chords, a technique that owes a lot to Rachmaninoff. Wagner is not afraid to strum around inside the piano or to create drumming sounds by using his fingers to stop the strings, as he did in the theme from “Chariots of Fire.”

While Wagner displays a great fondness for such quirky titles as “Chickenlips,” “Pelican” and “Humptulips,” the music itself is pretty much in the mainstream of tuneful pops, with only an annoying hint of New Age.

Of the three non-original pieces Wagner played, I enjoyed most the wistful solo arrangement of Irvin Berlin’s “Blue Skies” and the fast, efficient boogie made out of Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm.” Wagner’s signature, “MacArthur Park,” became a symphonic poem too long by far for my taste, but just about right for the audience’s true Wagnerites.

Anderson offered some fleet, flashy solos and Buono, a Spokane native, was an excellent, inventive drummer.

Stefan Kozinski led the orchestral portion of the program and the two numbers of Wagner’s set with his customary energy and enthusiasm. Neither energy nor enthusiasm, though, can provide the hard-edge precision required for most pops arrangements.

The orchestra was at its best in the medley of Gershwin favorites in Jim Baker’s craftsmanlike and comforting big band arrangements. Marion Evan’s “La Teresita” was a showcase for the symphony’s talented trumpeter, Larry Jess.

The most adventurous piece on the orchestra’s set came in Frank Foster’s harmonically progressive, bop-oriented “Shiny Stockings,” written for Count Basie’s Band. The sheen of “Stockings” was dimmed somewhat by a lack of Basie-Band precision. The same was true of Kozinski’s own “Back Hand Blues.”

There can be no complaints about Wagner’s precision. His technique has been honed by hundreds, maybe even thousands, of club and concert dates.

Not only is Wagner an extraordinary player, but the easy-going wit and confident delivery of his spoken introductions make him the antithesis of the rotten-brat style of many performers. It’s a pleasure to hear him play and watch him work.

MEMO: This sidebar ran with story: HIGHLIGHT Walt Wagner’s combination of pianistic dazzle and easy-going wit.