Special Event - Yuja Wang
Friday April 17, 2009 8:00PM
Description:
"If her combination of steely technique, emotional generosity and sheer fearlessness doesn’t propel this young Chinese American pianist to stardom soon, I’ll eat my hat."
-Joshua Kosman
The winner of the prestigious Gilmore Young Artist Award in 2006, Yuja Wang has gone on to appear with the New York Philharmonic, Chicago, Houston, and San Francisco Symphonies, the NHK Symphony Orchestra in Japan, and the NAC Orchestra in Canada. She is one of the most significant artists of her generation. Her performance of Tchaikovsky’s beloved First Piano Concerto promises to be a season highlight.
Ms. Wang is joined by an equally thrilling conducting talent, Carolyn Kuan. Associate Conductor of the Seattle Symphony, Ms. Kuan has had a continuing relationship with the Cabrillo Music Festival, one of the country’s most exciting laboratories of new music. One of the pieces she has championed there is Hard Road from Shu by the young Taiwanese composer Chiayu.
Neatly framing this program that bridges East and West is John Adams’ Chairman Dances. An ‘out-take’ of the American composer’s ground-breaking opera Nixon in China, the music presents a foxtrot between Chairman Mao and his wife, the fabled Madame Mao. Adams highlights Madame Mao’s movie actress past as the music veers between the slinky, the sentimental and the bravura.
Points of interest
· -Tchaikovsky initially sought to dedicate his first Piano Concerto to Nicholas Rubinstein, but the dedicatee was less than enthusiastic. He characterized the piece, somewhat tactlessly, as “clumsy and unplayable, when not vulgar and chaotic.” Years later, Rubinstein changed his tune and championed the work – though by that point, the work had already been re-dedicated to Hans von Bülow.
Performance made possible by the Norman C. Nitschke Foundation
Sponsored by National City
Congratulations to our Rockwell's dinner and Symphony concert ticket winners!
Bill Rose
Isabel Escobar
Judy Preston
Lori Allen
Over 400 names were entered into the drawing. Thanks for participating!
Program:
Adams The Chairman Dances,
Foxtrot for Orchestra 12'
Chiayu Hard Road from Shu 7'
Borodin Polovtsian Dances 14'
INTERMISSION
Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor 32'
WGTE - FM91 broadcasts the Toledo Symphony on FM 91 In Concert through the generosity of the Edward H. Schmidt Musical Arts Fund. Tonight's concert will be broadcast Thursday, September 10, 2009 at 8 p.m.
