The Chronicle-Herald, February 17, 2000

St. John electrifying, Paul shows adept hand

Lara St. John is the most remarkable young Canadian violonist of our time. She fuses technical virtuosity of the highest order with a musical imagination unmatched for intensity, variety and richness.

Prokofiev required her to pull out her entire bag of violinistic tricks: harmonics both natural and artificial, as well as extremes of register and articulation like the super-pianissimo high D at the end of the first and last movoment or the thick double stops on G string in the middle movement, bowed so high on the fingerboard that the sound, if attacked with sufficient fury, as indeed it gloriously was, is a rooster tail of mud and vegetable swamp broth.

A moment later St. John emerged from this turgid soup with a sound as light and fleeting as a tiny bird nimbly flying into the sun with the alacrity of a rocket.

Imagination, daring, mastery - St. John has it all, and the level of a superstar.