Interview with Yuja Wang

By -

Yuja Wang travels about the world performing concerts and recitals, so catching up with her for an interview is pretty difficult. However, in the midst of all this she was able to spare some time to answer a few questions. I found her answers illuminating and I hope you do too.

Q: You seem to be equally at home with Chopin as with Scriabin or Ligeti. You also perform everything from Prokofiev and Rachmaninoff to Brahms and Scarlatti. Is there a composer you resonate with the most right now? Who is it and what about their music do you most enjoy?

A: Right now I’m enjoying listening to Schubert lieder. It goes straight to the heart. As for playing, I have to say that I’m promiscuous when it comes to composers. I love them all.

This is great to hear since I'm hoping Ms Wang will consider one of my compositions someday.

Q: Is there a living composer you find intriguing, someone you'd like to write a piano piece for you to premiere?

A: Sofia Gubaidulina. Her violin concerto is so intense and spiritual. But I’ve yet to look at her piano repertoire.

Q: In terms of piano technique, what sort of music do you most enjoy playing? Music with lots of finger work, or is a melody more interesting?

A: I enjoy playing whatever I find interesting -- something magnetic will grasp me, whether it’s a haunting melody, beautiful harmony or just sheer savage wildness.

Q: Numerous composers have written piano preludes, however these don't tend to be concert pieces (like Sonatas and Concertos). Whose preludes do you find most enjoyable to play - and why?

A: I think preludes are great in recital. Chopin is unbeatable and Scriabin is out of this world.

Q: Do you ever play the piano to relax? If so, when you are not traveling, or preparing a piece for an upcoming performance, whose music do you like to "relax" to?

A: When I relax I don't play the piano. I don't even let the thought of piano come to mind :) But I do listen to music -- a lot. Non-classical too.

Cool... I think it's great when performers don't lock themselves into one genre... I'd like to talk more about what type of music you like. So, What sort of music do you listen to when you're not playing?

A: I listen to symphonies, opera, jazz and tango. And Sting and Jeff Buckley.

Q: It's been 7 years since you won the Aspen Music Festival's Concerto Competition and moved to the US. Have you become accustomed to life in the US, or do you travel so much that "home" is more a suitcase and hotel suite rather than any single location?

A. I think I naturally became “Americanized” living here while I was training and going to school at Curtis. But now it does mostly seem like my home is the airport, a hotel, or a concert hall. As long as I have a piano, my suitcase and a bed, I am home. But my shelter, the place I return to, is New York.

My daughter's home is New York, even though she's living in Edinburgh right now. Although, how do you keep practiced while traveling so much?

A: It’s tough. And I’m constantly trying to figure out where and when I can practice, though it helps that much of my work is mental. Still, I like to practice about three hours a day at the piano.

Q: Performing in so many different venues, you have to perfect your playing on a variety of different pianos. Is there one in particular that you found enjoyable, or a concert you can remember particularly fun? If so, why...

A. There are so many variables in concerts -- not just the piano, but the acoustics, the audience, my mood, weather, and -- in the performance of a concerto -- the energy you get from the orchestra. It’s too hard to single out one particular performance that I found enjoyable, but I find I work well in high pressure concerts, and usually the only regret I have is that it went by too fast.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Role of Music in Opera

By -
There are numerous books on the topic, and every composer, librettist, director, singer and audience member has their opinion as to what role the music should play in an opera. In a play without music, the words ought to support the meaning behind a character's actions. However, in the case of action movies, often times the action is what tells the story and there aren't words, just images to forward the plot. We might hear music to accompany action, build tension, but the action tells the story. Musicals tend to speak until the emotion of the moment just "has" to break out in song - unless it's something like "Mama Mia" where the dialog is the rails we travel on between songs; the songs themselves, written before the concept of the musical, are the focus of the production, while the story is secondary. Operas are a different beast. The music provides emotion to the words spoken, but it also plays the role of ambience when there is only action. In &quo
Read more

Episode 210b: Joyeuse le départ

By -
Image
Podcast:  Play in new window  |  Download Subscribe:  Apple Podcasts  |  Android  |  Google Play  |  Stitcher  |  TuneIn  |  RSS Provost Cunningham has Transmigrated, but to where! What is Dr Sage going to do with his body? And how can she bring home her friends, Abigail and Erasmus, without also bring home Cunningham? What are they going to say when they find the “skeleton” she’s hiding in her closet? Cast: Eddie Louise Clark  as Dr Sage Chip Clark  as Professor Savant Justin Bremer  as the Narrator Emily Riley Piatt  as Abigail Entwhistle, Calypso & Dean Stewart Written by  Eddie Louise Theme music by  Unwoman Sound Design by  Chip Michael
Read more

The Art of String Quartets by Brian Ferneyhough

By -
Image
When an artist sets paint to canvas, there are brush strokes used for different effects. Sometimes those strokes are subtle, imperceptible; they produce works of art like the Mona Lisa . Other times the very obvious nature of the stroke is the art, as in works by Van Gogh. With some composers of music, the notes on the page are their craft. How those notes translate into an aural experience is what defines some composers as great artists. Brian Ferneyhough has a masterful command of the techniques of putting notes on the page. These techniques are sometimes so subtle, even though written in black and white, they escape detection. Some of what he attempts with his music is just that, to escape detection, to bury the framework, diverting the ear away from the structure, so only the music is heard . The subtlety is so fine it is almost imperceptible. Even though he studied at several institutions, he is considered self-taught, studying scores from Boule
Read more