Blogcritics: Concert Review (NYC): Taiwan Philharmonic, Paul Huang – Music of Bruch, Mendelssohn, Debussy, Ke-Chia Chen
The Taiwan Philharmonic’s concert at Lincoln Center on Friday night was a festive affair. Conductor Jun Märkl brought sweeping majesty to Debussy’s La Mer and Mendelssohn’s Hebrides Overture. Violinist Paul Huang dazzled with Max Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy for Violin and Orchestra. And the concert opened with a spectacular new piece by Taiwanese composer Ke-Chia Chen titled Ebb and Flow, written for the orchestra’s current tour.
Sometimes you can tell when musicians are really delighted to be where they are. There was that sense of excitement on the stage at David Geffen Hall, matching the enthusiasm bubbling in the audience. Musicians crowded the stage wall-to-wall, and you could feel positive energy emanating from them as individuals as well as collectively. The program’s theme was islands and oceans, but the feeling was homey, like a huge family reunion.
Blogcritics
By Jon Sobel
The Taiwan Philharmonic’s concert at Lincoln Center on Friday night was a festive affair. Conductor Jun Märkl brought sweeping majesty to Debussy’s La Mer and Mendelssohn’s Hebrides Overture. Violinist Paul Huang dazzled with Max Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy for Violin and Orchestra. And the concert opened with a spectacular new piece by Taiwanese composer Ke-Chia Chen titled Ebb and Flow, written for the orchestra’s current tour.
Sometimes you can tell when musicians are really delighted to be where they are. There was that sense of excitement on the stage at David Geffen Hall, matching the enthusiasm bubbling in the audience. Musicians crowded the stage wall-to-wall, and you could feel positive energy emanating from them as individuals as well as collectively. The program’s theme was islands and oceans, but the feeling was homey, like a huge family reunion.
Read more here.
Violin Channel: VC Artist Paul Huang to Join Taiwan Philharmonic on American Tour
Known in Taiwan as the National Symphony Orchestra, the Taiwan Philharmonic (NSO) is one of the first international orchestras to be presented by the New York Philharmonic in David Geffen Hall in its return to the U.S. this spring.
The NSO’s 2023 tour follows previous successful tours of the U.S. with violinist Cho-Liang Lin in 2016, and with pianist Stephen Hough and violinist Yu-Chien Tseng in 2018.
This year VC Artist violinist Paul Huang will join the NSO, and its music director Jun Märkl, for its David Geffen Hall debut on the tour’s last three days with Max Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy Op. 46.
Violin Channel
The Taiwan Philharmonic and conductor Jun Märkl will perform across New York City, Chicago, and Washington D.C. from April 14–23, 2023
Known in Taiwan as the National Symphony Orchestra, the Taiwan Philharmonic (NSO) is one of the first international orchestras to be presented by the New York Philharmonic in David Geffen Hall in its return to the U.S. this spring.
The NSO’s 2023 tour follows previous successful tours of the U.S. with violinist Cho-Liang Lin in 2016, and with pianist Stephen Hough and violinist Yu-Chien Tseng in 2018.
This year VC Artist violinist Paul Huang will join the NSO, and its music director Jun Märkl, for its David Geffen Hall debut on the tour’s last three days with Max Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy Op. 46.
The tour starts on April 14, 2023, in Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, with a chamber music concert featuring members of the Taiwan Philharmonic & Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.
Read more here.
Photo: Marco Borggreve
Violin Channel: VC Artist Paul Huang Opens 2022/23 Season at the Taiwan Philharmonic
Huang will perform Bruch's Scottish Fantasy as part of a program of Scottish-themed music
As the featured soloist for the Taiwan Philharmonic, also known as National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) in Taiwan, VC Artist Paul Huang will perform alongside Music Director Jun Märkl. The season-opening programs will be presented in three venues: the National Concert Hall, the Weiwuying National Kaohsiung Concert Hall, and the Taitung Art and Culture Center.
Huang will perform Max Bruch's Scottish Fantasy, as part of a Scottish-themed program that also includes Debussy's Marche écossaise sur un thème populaire and Mendelssohn's Symphony No. 3 "Scottish."
Violin Channel
Huang will perform Bruch's Scottish Fantasy as part of a program of Scottish-themed music
As the featured soloist for the Taiwan Philharmonic, also known as National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) in Taiwan, VC Artist Paul Huang will perform alongside Music Director Jun Märkl. The season-opening programs will be presented in three venues: the National Concert Hall, the Weiwuying National Kaohsiung Concert Hall, and the Taitung Art and Culture Center.
Huang will perform Max Bruch's Scottish Fantasy, as part of a Scottish-themed program that also includes Debussy's Marche écossaise sur un thème populaire and Mendelssohn's Symphony No. 3 "Scottish."
"I'm particularly excited about returning to my homeland, Taiwan, to share the stage with the Taiwan Philharmonic and Maestro Jun Markl again, because this will be the opening night of its first post-pandemic season," Paul told The Violin Channel.
Read more here.
Van Magazine: An Orchestra Plays By COVID Rules
Van Magazine’s Jefrey Arlo Brown spoke with Shao-Chia Lü, Taiwan Philharmonic’s music director since 2010, and executive director Wen-Chen Kuo about the pragmatic art of the post-pandemic concert.
Van Magazine
Jefrey Arlo Brown
Asia is the future of classical music, goes the tired cliché repeated by such luminaries as Simon Rattle. As the COVID-19 pandemic wanes in places like Taiwan and the Republic of Korea, however, that banality becomes quite literally true. East Asian orchestras, supported by competent governments and resilient public healthy systems, are beginning to play for live audiences again—a state of affairs many European and, especially, American musicians can only dream of.
What will that future look like? A series of concerts, both live and livestreamed, on May 24 (the Serenades by Dvořák and Tchaikovsky, and a work by Tyzen Hsiao), on May 30 (Mozart’s “Gran Partita” and Dvořák’s Serenade Op. 22), and June 12 (Beethoven Five and Seven), has allowed the National Symphony Orchestra of Taipei, Taiwan, to feel for a new role in a changed world.
Last week, I spoke with Shao-Chia Lü, the orchestra’s music director since 2010, and executive director Wen-Chen Kuo about the pragmatic art of the post-pandemic concert.
Read the interview here.
Financial Times: When Will the Music Start Again?
When the National Symphony Orchestra of Taiwan came out on stage to play on Sunday night, it fired the starting gun for concert life to resume. After months of the coronavirus lockdown, here at last was an orchestra playing in front of a live audience in a concert hall.
Financial Times
Richard Fairman
When the National Symphony Orchestra of Taiwan came out on stage to play on Sunday night, it fired the starting gun for concert life to resume. After months of the coronavirus lockdown, here at last was an orchestra playing in front of a live audience in a concert hall.
Read more here.
The Strad: National Symphony Orchestra, Taiwan, Resumes Concerts
The National Symphony Orchestra, Taiwan [also known as the Taiwan Philharmonic] is to begin performing again in a series of 3 concerts on 24 May, 30 May and 12 June at Taiwan’s National Theatre and Concert Hall. All three ‘sofa concerts’ will be live-streamed on YouTube and other platforms and will be available to view afterwards too.
The Strad
The National Symphony Orchestra, Taiwan [also known as the Taiwan Philharmonic] is to begin performing again in a series of 3 concerts on 24 May, 30 May and 12 June at Taiwan’s National Theatre and Concert Hall. All three ‘sofa concerts’ will be live-streamed on YouTube and other platforms and will be available to view afterwards too.
The first live concert, beginning at 19:30 Taiwan time (12:30 CET/7:30 EDT), includes Dvořák’s Serenade in D minor; Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings in C Major; and Tyzen Hsiao’s Bang Chhun Hong (‘Longing for the Spring Breeze’), composed in the 1930s.
Read more here.
San Francisco Classical Voice: Taiwan Philharmonic Offers A Fresh Perspective on Orchestral Music
How different the same hall feels with another orchestra onstage. For starters, at Monday’s Taiwan Philharmonic concert, women not only outnumbered men — they were extraordinarily well-represented even in the sections (double bass, brass, and especially, leadership positions) that remain male-dominated in this country’s orchestras. There was no concertmaster entrance; in fact, the orchestra entered the Davies stage en masse. And the applause, after every movement, didn’t feel wrong.
San Francisco Classical Voice
Rebecca Wishnia
How different the same hall feels with another orchestra onstage. For starters, at Monday’s Taiwan Philharmonic concert, women not only outnumbered men — they were extraordinarily well-represented even in the sections (double bass, brass, and especially, leadership positions) that remain male-dominated in this country’s orchestras. There was no concertmaster entrance; in fact, the orchestra entered the Davies stage en masse. And the applause, after every movement, didn’t feel wrong.
To read more, click here.