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Aria of Kawa – Xu Hong piano recital @ Shenzhen Concert Hall – Futian
July 9, 2023 All day
beethoven once said
“Music should spark the human spirit”
And in this spiritual fire played by instruments
The piano is the most shining flower
Eighty-eight black and white keys, falling at the fingertips
Create a magnificent and rich world
Boundless imagination and exploration are thus opened
In the summer of July, an exquisite and elegant piano recital will be staged in Shenzhen Concert Hall. This time, the pianist who is about to control this “King of Musical Instruments” to perform for the audience in Shenzhen can be said to be outstanding in strength and has attracted much attention:
The New York Times once commented that he ” possesses brilliant technique, keen musical insight, and seemingly limitless potential. ” Rising Star of Tomorrow” .
He is the international pianist – Xu Hong .
Start with talent, practice in deep cultivation
Xu Hong’s piano talent was revealed very early. He learned piano at the age of 3, and was admitted to the middle school attached to Wuhan Conservatory of Music with the first place at the age of 12. At a young age, he made his mark in major competitions with outstanding results. After that, he flew to the other side of the ocean alone, and studied at the Eastman School of Music and the Juilliard School of Music in the United States. From undergraduate all the way to a doctorate, Xu Hong continued to practice and accumulate in the world of black and white keys.
As they say, talent and hard work are never incompatible. During his studies, he not only studied piano art assiduously, but also carried out a lot of artistic practice. In the tempering again and again, I have gained growth and rewards. He has achieved great results in major international piano competitions such as Honens, Gina Bachauer, and Hilton Head; in 2008, Xu Hong was awarded the Juilliard Academy The highest piano award “Arthur Rubinstein Award”. In 2010, he successfully obtained an artist diploma from the Juilliard School of Music, becoming the only doctor in piano performance who graduated from the Juilliard School that year.
The “Piano Prodigy” who shines in the music scene
With his outstanding performance skills and musical accomplishment, Xu Hong has been invited to perform with many world-class masters. In 2007, he successfully cooperated with the American Juilliard Orchestra led by pianist and well-known conductor Vladimir Ashkenazy at the Lincoln Center for the Arts. In 2008, he held a solo concert in the prestigious Wigmore Hall in the UK, and the master composer Frederic Rzewski even composed music for it himself.
This much-loved pianist has performed in major music venues around the world, and has collaborated with many world-renowned groups, such as the British BBC Orchestra, the Russian National Symphony Orchestra, the Portuguese National Symphony Orchestra, and the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra. wait. In recent years, he has also been invited by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Manchester Halle Symphony Orchestra, and China National Center for the Performing Arts Orchestra to perform tours in Asia and the UK, and his brilliant performance has also been loved and recognized by the audience.
sower of musical beauty
The halo added to his body, but his progress never stopped. For Xu Hong, music and study are a lifetime thing. And he, who is deeply involved in classical music, also hopes to pass on the eternal charm of this art to more people. Therefore, in addition to his busy stage performances, he is also actively involved in music education and popularization.
As a professor of the Piano Department of Wuhan Conservatory of Music , Xu Hong has not only cultivated batches of outstanding piano students, but also often popularizes music knowledge and shares music insights with the general public by writing music essays and publishing online live lectures. In addition, the master classes and lectures he held in various places are also very popular, including “Classical Style”, “Sonata Form Research”, “Schubert Wanderer Fantasia”, “Mozart Lecture Series”, “Chopin’s Complete Ballads” and so on. Class rich themes. Xu Hongzheng has been practicing his musical ideals for ten years through sowing seeds in many fields such as lectures, studies, and performances.
On July 8, the multi-talented pianist
will be arranged with his unique repertoire
Present a classical and romantic poetic dialogue
Aria of Rivers – Xu Hong Piano Recital
/performance track/
Mozart: Piano Sonata in B flat major, K.570
Liszt: Fountain at the Manor d’Esther
Mozart: Piano Sonata in B flat major, K.333
Liszt: Saint Francis walked on water,
From “Legend, No.2”
Mozart: Piano Sonata in B flat major, K.281
Scriabin: Sonata No. 3 in F-sharp minor, Op. 23
(The track is based on the live performance)
For Xu Hong, Mozart is the “brightest star in the night sky” of classical music. Since he formally learned the piano, the music of this “music prodigy” has accompanied him throughout his growth. Over the years, Xu Hong has also been focusing on the research and performance of Mozart’s works.
In this concert, Xu Hong chose Mozart’s three “Sonatas in B-flat major” (K.281/K.333/K.570) , respectively spanning the early, middle and late stages of his piano sonata creation. The three periods present Mozart’s state of mind and work style at different stages.
Regarding this special arrangement of simultaneously presenting multiple pieces of the same key by one composer in one concert, Xu Hong said:
Works in B-flat major always have a touch of warmth, and are inextricably linked with opera arias. So I think juxtaposing works of a tonality and a genre will allow the audience to find the differences between them and recognize the similarities between them, so that they can better understand our composers.
Interspersed between these three “monotonous” but not boring Mozart sonatas are three other “soul works” from Liszt and Scriabin . Their addition also adds a richer layer to the concert.
Liszt’s “Fountain of Este Manor” is selected from the fourth piece of the third volume of his piano music collection “Traveling Years”. This is one of his most important works in his later years. The work is characterized by flowing melody and rich timbre , vividly depicting the sparkling fountains and the splashing of water in the Manor d’Este.
At this time, Liszt changed from the extroverted flamboyant style of the past, and instead tried to integrate the impression elements deep in the soul into music to express the poetic flavor of things themselves. This is the sound that he created from the soul after he has experienced the colorful world, precipitated and internalized, and the colors of his works have become more restrained, simple and concise.
Another piece of Liszt’s “St. Francis Walking on Water” that will be presented in the concert comes from the second of his two legendary pieces. Legendary music often refers to romantic epic ballads. Liszt used rich musical vocabulary to describe the legendary story of St. Francis into an epic picture scroll. A series of arpeggios stacked on the keys, as if a saint walking on water, a vivid music picture leaps in front of his eyes, and Liszt’s pious desire for peace also permeates between the notes.
Scriabin’s “Sonata No. 3 in F-sharp Minor, Op. 23”, which appeared last, was extremely shocking, full of strong and profound emotions. This is the longest sonata in his early days. The composer called this work “the state of the soul”. Each movement expresses a different state, and the four movements together present a unified psychological process.
Scriabin uses his imaginative and conflicting musical language to fully display the Russian pathos and enthusiasm, melancholy and sweetness. The work is avant-garde and modern, but still retains a romantic and soft sense of hearing, so it has also been loved by countless pianists, and it can be said to be one of the most played piano sonatas.
When the “monotonous” Mozart meets the multidimensional “soul”, how will the three composers with different styles meet under Xu Hong’s nimble fingertips? On July 8, let us meet at the Shenzhen Concert Hall and experience this auditory feast that spans time and space together!
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