PRETORIA NEWS (Riek van Rensburg)
“Pretoria pianist comes home: Petronel Malan elicits full houses and standing ovations”
Aardklop Festival, Potchefstroom, South Africa
October 5 and 6, 2001

Sanlam Auditorium:
...Malan was not unduly thwarted by and orchestra below par. She thrilled the masses with her playing of Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme by Paganini, op. 43. She eschewed vulgarity and seemed to penetrate to the very poetry behind the notes – not all steel, concrete and velocity. Still, she gave vent to the music’s rhetoric and did not intend to apologize for an overt appeal to the emotions.
She allowed many cliched phrases to emerge with new emphasis. For example, the rubato of the famous no. 18 was compulsive but not over-romantic, the left hand exquisitely sensitive.

Potchefstroom Conservatoire Hall:
"Pianism of the highest order and a deep poetic feeling characterized Malan’s solo recital. Her performance of Beethoven’s Les Adieux was beautifully graded with an infallible instinct and noble sense of design. Inner harmonies, multi-varied rubatos and accents abounded to enchant the audience, all in all, on a much more elevated musical plane than David Helfgott’s recent manic cavorting. 
Malan is clearly well-versed in the modern idiom. She surmounted Busoni’s Sonatina Seconda, a technically tricky, neo-classic work with magnificent ease and total empathy. Her wonderfully articulated playing, the brittle, kaleidoscopic colours, all added up to an electrifying performance. She is a provocative (mercifully void of any bombast) exponent of Rachmaninov. Her individual line was allied to a bold, clean piano image which lent a romantic, albeit a more austere profile to the 1931 revised version of the Sonata, op. 36. Plenty of sweep – even grandeur – was evident – in the variations of Our National Anthem, a work commissioned by and dedicated to Malan, by Carl van Wyk. And with what charm she imbued Cortot’s transcription of Schubert’s Heiden-roslein. Petronel may be an impulsive and impetuous player but in her hands the music never becomes a mere digital exercise.
Hers is a charismatic personality. Her dress sense is also accord with her particular unique talents and tastes. On this occasion, she was attired in a gown that goes back some 80 years and attributed to have belonged to Joan Crawford!