The New York Times: Review: Yunchan Lim, Teenage Piano Star, Arrives in New York
The 19-year-old musician made his New York Philharmonic debut with a powerful yet poetic performance of Rachmaninoff’s Third Concerto.
“He plays like a dream,” we say about musicians we like, meaning simply that they’re very good.
But when I say that Yunchan Lim, the 19-year-old pianist who made a galvanizing debut with the New York Philharmonic at David Geffen Hall on Wednesday, played like a dream, I mean something more literal.
I mean that there was, in his performance of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3, the juxtaposition of precise clarity and expansive reverie; the vivid scenes and bursts of wit; the sense of contrasting yet organically developing moods; the endless and persuasive bendings of time — the qualities that tend to characterize nighttime wanderings of the mind.
The New York Times
By Zachary Woolfe
The 19-year-old musician made his New York Philharmonic debut with a powerful yet poetic performance of Rachmaninoff’s Third Concerto.
“He plays like a dream,” we say about musicians we like, meaning simply that they’re very good.
But when I say that Yunchan Lim, the 19-year-old pianist who made a galvanizing debut with the New York Philharmonic at David Geffen Hall on Wednesday, played like a dream, I mean something more literal.
I mean that there was, in his performance of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3, the juxtaposition of precise clarity and expansive reverie; the vivid scenes and bursts of wit; the sense of contrasting yet organically developing moods; the endless and persuasive bendings of time — the qualities that tend to characterize nighttime wanderings of the mind.
This dreamy concert was among Lim’s first major professional performances outside his native South Korea, though he is already world-famous for this concerto. His blazing account of it secured his victory last June as the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition’s youngest-ever winner, and the video of that appearance has been viewed millions of times on YouTube.
Read more here.
Photo Credit: Chris Lee
Playbill: National Children's Chorus Makes Carnegie Hall Solo Debut May 6
The concert previews music the Grammy-winning group is set to record at London's Abbey Road Studios this summer.
The Grammy-winning National Children's Chorus makes its solo concert debut at Carnegie Hall's Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage May 6 at 3 PM. The concert, titled Voices of Action, Creating a World of Belonging, previews music the group is set to record at London's famed Abbey Road Studios this summer, part of their forthcoming holiday music album.
Playbill
By Logan Culwell-Block
The concert previews music the Grammy-winning group is set to record at London's Abbey Road Studios this summer.
The Grammy-winning National Children's Chorus makes its solo concert debut at Carnegie Hall's Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage May 6 at 3 PM. The concert, titled Voices of Action, Creating a World of Belonging, previews music the group is set to record at London's famed Abbey Road Studios this summer, part of their forthcoming holiday music album.
The multi-cultural offerings include the world premieres of Gaayatri Kaundinya's"Diya Jalein," the Spanish lullaby "A La Nanita Nana" by Carlos Cordero, Andy Beck's arrangement of the Nigerian carol "Betelehemu," and André J. Thomas and Langston Hughes' "I Dream a World," along with works by Sharon Farber, Ola Gjeilo, and Eric Whitacre.
The ensemble, made up of young singers aged 10 to 18, is led by conductors Luke McEndarfer, Dr. Pamela Blackstone, Dr. Allan Laiño, and Dr. Nicholas Nicassio.
Read more here.
San Francisco Classical Voice: Anne Akiko Meyers Brings Fandango to Symphony San José
Symphony San José’s concert on May 6 at the California Theatre featured Anne Akiko Meyers as soloist in Mexican composer Arturo Márquez’s new violin concerto, Fandango. Meyers requested the work from Márquez and gave the first performance, with Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, in August 2021. Since then, she has been taking the piece around on her guest appearances.
So it’s fortunate that when San José’s intended guest conductor, Tatsuya Shimono, withdrew for personal reasons less than two weeks before the concert, the Symphony was able to secure José Luis Gómez, music director of the Tucson Symphony, as a replacement. He had conducted Meyers in this same concerto in a Tucson program last September.
San Francisco Classical Voice
By David Bratman
Symphony San José’s concert on May 6 at the California Theatre featured Anne Akiko Meyers as soloist in Mexican composer Arturo Márquez’s new violin concerto, Fandango. Meyers requested the work from Márquez and gave the first performance, with Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, in August 2021. Since then, she has been taking the piece around on her guest appearances.
So it’s fortunate that when San José’s intended guest conductor, Tatsuya Shimono, withdrew for personal reasons less than two weeks before the concert, the Symphony was able to secure José Luis Gómez, music director of the Tucson Symphony, as a replacement. He had conducted Meyers in this same concerto in a Tucson program last September.
Meyers had been inspired to approach Márquez after hearing the composer’s Danzón No. 2, a boundlessly joyful expression of the character of Veracruz’s dance music that’s become something of a signature piece for Dudamel. Meyers hoped that Márquez could import something of the same spirit into a violin concerto. It turned out that the composer, whose father was a mariachi violinist, had already been thinking along those lines.
Read more here.
Photo Credit: Allen Murabayashi
WRTI: Michelle Cann shines a light with 'Revival: Music of Price & Bonds'
Philadelphia’s own Michelle Cann is one of the world’s most prominent performers of Florence Price’s piano music, and by far the go-to pianist for performances of Price’s Concerto in One Movement. Last year she released two albums featuring Price’s music, one of which won a Grammy award. Revival: Music of Price & Bonds gathers some of Price’s solo piano music alongside the recently published completion of a work by Margaret Bonds, one of Price’s star students. It’s an all-Philly affair: Cann is the Eleanor Sokoloff Chair in Piano Studies at the Curtis Institute of Music, and this is the second release on its new label, Curtis Studio.
WRTI
By John T.K. Scherch
Philadelphia’s own Michelle Cann is one of the world’s most prominent performers of Florence Price’s piano music, and by far the go-to pianist for performances of Price’s Concerto in One Movement. Last year she released two albums featuring Price’s music, one of which won a Grammy award. Revival: Music of Price & Bonds gathers some of Price’s solo piano music alongside the recently published completion of a work by Margaret Bonds, one of Price’s star students. It’s an all-Philly affair: Cann is the Eleanor Sokoloff Chair in Piano Studies at the Curtis Institute of Music, and this is the second release on its new label, Curtis Studio.
Read more here.
I Care If You Listen: Dai Wei Finds Freedom in Expression in Unconventional Career, with New Orchestral Commission
Dai Wei was a timid child with a giant tape recorder in her room. At age 11, she started recording herself singing and strumming guitar onto a blank cassette, the tape recorder as her personal diary. When her mother discovered the secret tape, Dai Wei felt that she had done something wrong. Fortunately, her mother was supportive and encouraged her to keep pursuing music.
I Care If You Listen
By Chrysanthe Tane
Dai Wei was a timid child with a giant tape recorder in her room. At age 11, she started recording herself singing and strumming guitar onto a blank cassette, the tape recorder as her personal diary. When her mother discovered the secret tape, Dai Wei felt that she had done something wrong. Fortunately, her mother was supportive and encouraged her to keep pursuing music.
…
With support from Allen R. and Judy Brick Freedman, the Curtis Symphony Orchestra recently commissioned a new orchestral work from Dai Wei for their first-ever West Coast tour (coming up May 12-22). Dai Wei’s idea for Awakening Lion began with the simple realization that she had never represented her Cantonese identity in music before. With that as her starting point, she approached the composition “like a chef,” grabbing different ingredients — short sounds, ideas, and motives — to support the concept of a Cantonese Lion Dance. One of the ingredients in the piece is having two cellists evoke a guqin by plucking their strings with a guitar pick. Another is having the orchestra imitate martial arts calls by shouting “oooooooo a-HA!” “I aimed to provoke the spirit of the awakening lion,” Dai Wei said, “the inner strength which presents in everyone, regardless of where we come from, who we love, or our gender.”
Read more here.
Photo Credit: Sha Tao
Oregon Arts Watch: All Classical On the Move
The term “classical music radio” suggests revered, decades-old recordings of music by familiar, long-dead composers. You wouldn’t expect to associate it with 21st century music, Oregon performers and composers, young audiences, or, really, innovation. But while Portland’s All Classical radio’s airwaves and internet streams still abound with recordings of Old Masters, and likely always will, the station has lately been going way beyond its increasingly inaccurate name.
Oregon Arts Watch
By Brett Campbell
Portland’s ambitious, forward-looking classical music radio station is expanding its scope, creating space for live performances, and relocating to downtown Portland.
The term “classical music radio” suggests revered, decades-old recordings of music by familiar, long-dead composers. You wouldn’t expect to associate it with 21st century music, Oregon performers and composers, young audiences, or, really, innovation. But while Portland’s All Classical radio’s airwaves and internet streams still abound with recordings of Old Masters, and likely always will, the station has lately been going way beyond its increasingly inaccurate name.
And now, as its 40th anniversary approaches, the “independent, community-funded radio station and multimedia platform” (to use its own description) is moving even farther afield — literally. It’s crossing the Rubicon, or at least the Willamette, relocating its operations from the Portland Opera building on the east bank to an office tower in the heart of downtown Portland, and creating new, state-of-the-art production studios for broadcast, video, recordings, and live performances of music and theater by Oregon artists. Construction is underway, with the move-in expected in early 2024.
Read more here.
The New York Times: Illuminating Rachmaninoff’s Vespers, a Pinnacle of Russian Sacred Rep
In a classical music world obsessed with anniversaries, be they grand or modest, the 150th birthday of the Russian émigré composer Sergei Rachmaninoff has inevitably drawn notice. Just as inevitably, commemorations have tended to focus on his war horses: the symphonies, piano concertos and solo piano works.
It seems to have fallen to Steven Fox and his excellent choirs to tend to Rachmaninoff’s motley but treasurable body of choral works. The sacred ones, particularly — with their flowing yet restrained lyricism and none of the bombast or sentimentality often associated with the composer — represent the very best of Rachmaninoff.
The New York Times
By James R. Oestreich
Steven Fox and the Clarion Choir are tending to a less well-known part of the composer’s canon for his 150th birthday: His choral works.
In a classical music world obsessed with anniversaries, be they grand or modest, the 150th birthday of the Russian émigré composer Sergei Rachmaninoff has inevitably drawn notice. Just as inevitably, commemorations have tended to focus on his war horses: the symphonies, piano concertos and solo piano works.
It seems to have fallen to Steven Fox and his excellent choirs to tend to Rachmaninoff’s motley but treasurable body of choral works. The sacred ones, particularly — with their flowing yet restrained lyricism and none of the bombast or sentimentality often associated with the composer — represent the very best of Rachmaninoff.
On Wednesday, Fox, the artistic director of the New York-based Clarion Music Society, will return to his alma mater — Dartmouth College, in Hanover, N.H. — to lead the Clarion Choir in Rachmaninoff’s exquisite All-Night Vigil, a pinnacle of the rich Russian Orthodox repertory. They will repeat the performance on Friday at Carnegie Hall.
Read more here.
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.
Houston Chronicle: Houston's Windsync quintet brings back multi-site music fest that begins Tuesday
Playing more than 100 dates out of town each year has taken Windsync to some interesting places, but it’s hard to beat where the Houston-based wind quintet found themselves last November. They checked into London’s Abbey Road Studios to record an album of pieces by Seattle-based composer Miguel del Aguila, which the group hopes to release later this year.
It was a little like recording in a museum, explains bassoonist and artistic director Kara LaMoure.
Houston Chronicle
By Chris Gray
Playing more than 100 dates out of town each year has taken Windsync to some interesting places, but it’s hard to beat where the Houston-based wind quintet found themselves last November. They checked into London’s Abbey Road Studios to record an album of pieces by Seattle-based composer Miguel del Aguila, which the group hopes to release later this year.
It was a little like recording in a museum, explains bassoonist and artistic director Kara LaMoure.
Read more here.
SYMPHONY MAGAZINE: YOUTH ON THE RISE
After the New York Youth Symphony submitted its debut album in the Best Orchestral Performance category for the 2022 Grammy Awards, neither the young musicians nor their music director, Michael Repper, thought they’d edge out competition like the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Berlin Philharmonic. Yet in February, the fresh-faced ensemble became the first youth orchestra to be awarded a Grammy, winning with a recording of music by Black women.
Symphony Magazine
By Vivien Schweitzer
After the New York Youth Symphony submitted its debut album in the Best Orchestral Performance category for the 2022 Grammy Awards, neither the young musicians nor their music director, Michael Repper, thought they’d edge out competition like the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Berlin Philharmonic. Yet in February, the fresh-faced ensemble became the first youth orchestra to be awarded a Grammy, winning with a recording of music by Black women.
The album, which reached #1 on Billboard’s “Traditional Classical Albums” chart, features the first recording by an American orchestra of Florence Price’s Ethiopia’s Shadow in America (1932). It also includes Price’s Piano Concerto in One Movement (1934) with soloist Michelle Cann. The NYYS had been scheduled to perform the work with Cann at Carnegie Hall in the spring of 2020, but after the pandemic shuttered concert halls Repper decided instead to record it with Cann.
Read more here.