Igor Levit: No Fear

Fly-on-the-wall documentary following the pianist Igor Levit from the final recordings of his Beethoven piano sonata cycle and into the beginning of Covid lockdown, when public music-making stopped and Levit gave a series of concerts from his apartment in Berlin.

The film offers a very good look at the day-to-day life of a world-class artist: going from concert to studio to sleep, all the while feeding the social media beast, which will eventually turn into an important medium for Levit during Covid lockdown. The intimate collaboration between Levit and Andreas Neubronner, the recording engineer (Tonmeister says it better in German) is a joy. It's also a slight comfort to see that there's music that proves a technical challenge for even the most gifted of pianists as Levit works through Ronald Stevenson's massive 'Passacaglia on DSCH'.

The filmmakers are at a respectful distance from the subject, so the insights the viewer gets are more about the practicalities of life (mostly) on the road. But there are insights aplenty in the music, of course, and that's a real pleasure, especially some of the joyous collaborations.