Pizzicato: 35 Years of Shanghai Quartet: Beethoven forever

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Remy Franck

35 years ago, one of today's foremost chamber ensembles, the Shanghai Quartet, was formed at the Shanghai Conservatory. Since that year they have played around 3000 concerts and recorded 35 albums. Remy Franck met First violinist and founding member Weigang Li in his native Shanghai.

As many Chinese and, more generally, Asian violinists, you studied in the United States….

Yes, but I made the major part of my studies in China, if you don’t consider the fact that studying does never stop. I was born into a family of well-known musicians in Shanghai. Both of my parents were professional violinists and my maternal grand-father was also a violinist. He was born in 1908 and was one of the earliest professional classical violinists in China. I began studying the violin with my parents when I was five and went on to attend the Shanghai Conservatory at 14. Three years later, in 1981, when I was seventeen, I was chosen to go to study for one year at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music through a cultural exchange program between the sister cities of Shanghai and San Francisco. In 1985, I graduated from the Shanghai Conservatory and went on studying again – for my finishing touch – in the United States. But by then, we had already created the Quartet.

Your quartet played in the Stern competition, you having been replaced by a candidate. Was this important for your ensemble?

It is very important for the competition to have this chamber music round. For us it was enriching too. We had interesting ideas which were brought in by the contestants. For me, obviously, it was strange to sit in the Jury and not be part of the ensemble. It was even more astonishing, how flexible my colleagues were when one of the young candidates asked for something very unusual for us. I told myself: ‘Oh, they can do that’. And I am not sure, my colleagues would have agreed if I proposed such a point (laughs).

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Pizzicato: Ahead of SISIVC: Remembering Isaac Stern…

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Remy Franck

A few days before leaving for Shanghai to attend the final of the Isaac Stern Violin Competition, impossible for me to not remember the only and highly memorable concert with Isaac Stern in Luxembourg. It took place in the early Seventies at the Grand Theatre with Music Director Louis de Froment conducting the RTL Symphony Orchestra and Isaac Stern playing the Brahms Violin Concerto. I remember an extraordinary spontaneous and dynamic performance with great textures from the solo violin and all the meaning and intensity the music deserved. Stern’s playing not only showed a great depth of understanding of the composer but also a stunning ability to translate the composer’s most personal meaning to the audience.

In 2018, with the second edition of the The Shanghai Isaac Stern International Violin Competition (SISIVC) one of Stern’s most important abilities – besides his musicality – is continued: the support of young musicians.

It is widely known that he helped Itzhak Perlman, Pinchas Zukerman and Shlomo Mintz at the beginning of their career. As Peter Pastreich said in a tribute to Stern: « There were many other young music students who arrived in New York without friends or money who came to study with DeLay. Isaac found friends of his they could live with, sent them to his dentist at his expense, got them instruments and bows, and most important, listened to them play. Dorothy once said to me, ‘People know that when there’s any really talented kid, Isaac will want to know. He’ll always find time to listen. I love Isaac.' »

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Pizzicato: Shanghai Isaac Stern Competition Announces Record Number of Applicants

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Organizers for the Shanghai Isaac Stern International Violin Competition (SISIVC) announced that a total of 174 applicants have been submitted for this year’s edition, an increase of more than 22% from the inaugural competition in 2016 (142 applicants).

Applicants hail from 33 countries and regions, an increase of 27% from 2016 (26 countries and regions). The greatest area of growth, by a significant margin, was in non-Chinese applicants (65% growth vs. 2016). Applicant countries/regions this year include: Australia, Azerbaijan, Bolivia, Canada, China, Czech, Ecuador, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong (China), Ireland, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Latvia, Libya, Malaysia, Netherlands, Poland, Russia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan (China), Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States, and Vietnam.

More than 90% of the applicants for the 2018 SISIVC have won prizes in national and international competitions and most are graduates or are currently attending premier music schools and institutions.

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Pizzicato: Shanghai Orchestra Academy collaborates with the European Youth Orchestra

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Over ten members of the European Union Youth Orchestra (EUYO) paid a visit to Shanghai Orchestra Academy (SOA) from October 23 and 27, 2017. During the five-day visit, young musicians from several European countries, including the UK, France, Germany and Bulgaria, performed alongside SOA students in routine rehearsals. In addition, SOA organized a series of cultural events, including an educational exchange lecture, giving the European visitors an extraordinary opportunity to learn about Chinese customs and traditions.

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