The Well-Tempered Ear
This Sunday at 4 p.m., the Salon Piano Series debuts an online recital by pianist Kangwoo Jin. He plays music by Scarlatti, Beethoven, Liszt and Schumann. It is up until May 9
Leave a Comment
PLEASE HELP THE EAR. IF YOU LIKE A CERTAIN BLOG POST, SPREAD THE WORD. FORWARD A LINK TO IT OR, SHARE IT or TAG IT (not just “Like” it) ON FACEBOOK. Performers can use the extra exposure to draw potential audience members to an event. And you might even attract new readers and subscribers to the blog.
By Jacob Stockinger
This Sunday afternoon at 4 p.m. CDT, the Salon Piano Series, hosted by Farley’s House of Pianos, will debut an online concert by pianist Kangwoo Jin (below, in a photo by Andy Manis).
The concert, which was recorded at Luther Memorial Church, costs $10 and will be available online through May 9.
The program is:
Scarlatti – Sonatas in D minor and D Major, K. 213 and 214 (ca. 1756-1757)
Beethoven – Sonata in C-sharp minor, Op. 27, No. 2, “Moonlight” (1801)
Liszt – Transcriptions for solo piano of the songs “Widmung” (Dedication) by Robert Schumann and “Litanei” (Litany) by Franz Schubert
Schumann – Symphonic Etudes, Op.13 (1830)
Bishop – Home, Sweet Home
Tickets are only available online at eventbrite.com. Service fees apply. Complete program and concert information is at salonpianoseries.org
PROGRAM NOTES
Jin has written the following program notes for The Ear:
“As a musician, I am always eager to share music with the public. I am very excited to be able to reach out to the audience with this unprecedented Salon Piano Series Virtual Concert.
“I believe music soothes our mental health in difficult times regardless of age, gender or race. I very much hope my performance will contribute to this collective healing we feel through music.
“I wanted to include three different styles, as I usually do for recitals. This time I have Baroque, Classical and Romantic music.
“I chose one of the most famous Beethoven sonatas in order to celebrate his 250th birth year (2020), which I did not have a chance to mark last year.
“This piece is popular with the title of “Moonlight,” which Beethoven (below) never intended. Five years after his death, the German critic Ludwig Rellstab used the word “Moonlight” in order to describe the first movement. But it was really inspired by the funeral march in Mozart’s opera “Don Giovanni.” I try to bring out the tragic color of the first movement. (You can hear Jin play the exciting final movement of the sonata in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
“I also wanted to play the virtuosic masterpiece “Symphonic Etudes,” Op. 13, by Robert Schumann (below), including the beautiful posthumous variations 4 and 5.
I find this piece special in the sense that Schumann intended to make this piece “symphonic.” He created multiple layers of voices in various ways through each etude and created orchestral sounds. This polyphonic writing with multiple layers and a thick texture is what makes this piece difficult to play.
“I also specifically wanted to include one of the piano transcriptions by Franz Liszt (below) of Schubert’s Litanei auf das Fest Aller Seelen (Litany for the Feast of All Souls), D. 343.
“Schubert (below) used the poem “Litany” by Johann Jacobi (1740-1814). It is written for comforting the deceased. Robert Capell, the author of the book “Schubert’s Songs” (1929), said about this lied: There was never a truer or more touching expression of simple devotion and consoled grief … “The music rises from a pure well of affection and humility.”
“I would like to dedicate this piece to all the people who suffered from Covid 19.”
BACKGROUND
Here is a link to Kangwoo Jin’s impressive website where you can see many photos, learn about his extensive career as a teacher and hear many samples of his playing: https://www.pianistkangwoojin.com
Praised for his “refined tone quality with powerful energy” (Chosun Daily Newspaper), Jin (below, in a photo by Steve Apps for the Wisconsin State Journal) concertizes nationally and internationally, including performances in Germany, Italy, China, Indonesia and South Korea.
He gave his debut concert at the Sejong Arts Center in Seoul, South Korea, sponsored by the Chosun Daily Newspaper. He has given live performances on Wisconsin Public Radio and WORT 89.9 FM.
Jin appears frequently as a guest artist at music festivals, universities and various concert series. Recent invitations include UW-River Falls, Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi, and Tongji University in Shanghai. Kawai Pianos USA has also invited him as a guest artist at the annual Piano Technicians Guild Convention and Technical Institute in Florida.
Jin completed the Bachelor of Music degree at Hanyang University in South Korea, then earned his Performer Diploma and Master’s of Music at Indiana University, where he worked as an associate instructor.
He is the recipient of the J. Battista Scholarship for performance excellence at Indiana University and received the Collins Distinguished Fellowship for his doctoral studies, completed last year, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he studied piano with Christopher Taylor and piano pedagogy with Jessica Johnson.
Tags: #AmericanPlayersTheatre, #ArtsCenter, #ArtSong, #BachelorofMusic, #BaroqueEra, #BaroqueMusic, #BeethovenYear, #BeijingChina, #BlogPost, #BlogPosting, #ChosunDailyNewspaper, #ChristianChurch, #ChristopherTaylor, #Classicalera, #ClassicalMusician, #CoronavirusPandemic, #CorpusChristi, #COVID-19, #DifficultTime, #DoctoralStudies, #DomenicoScarlatti, #DonGiovanni, #FacebookPost, #FacebookPosting, #Farley'sHouseofPianos, #FeastofAllSouls, #FranzLiszt, #FranzSchubert, #FuneralMarch, #GuestArtist, #HanyangUniversity, #HomeWebsite, #IndianaUniversity, #JacobStockinger, #JohannJacobi, #KangwooJin, #KawaiPianos, #LivePerformance, #LudwigVanBeethoven, #LutherMemorialChurch, #MajorKey, #MeadWitterSchoolofMusic, #MentalHealth, #MinorKey, #MoonlightSonata, #MusicCritic, #Musicfaculty, #MusicProfessor, #OnlineConcert, #OperaMusic, #PerformerDiploma, #PianoTechnician, #PolyphonicMusic, #ProgramNotes, #RobertSchumann, #RomanticEra, #RomanticMusic, #SalonPIanoSeries, #SchubertLieder, #SeoulSouthKorea, #ServiceFee, #ShanghaiChina, #SouthKorea, #SouthKorean, #SteveApps, #Sundayafternoon, #SymphonicEtudes, #TexasA&M, #TheEar, #TheUW, #Tongjiniversity, #UniversityofWisconsin-Madison, #UW-RiverFalls, #VirtualConcert, #VocalMusic, #WisconsinPublicRadio, #WisconsinStateJournal, #WolfgangAmadeusMozart, #YouTubevideo, affection, afternoon, age, April, art song, Arts, arts center, audience, auhtor, available, Bachelor of Music, Baroque, Baroque music, beautiful, Beethoven, Beethoven Year, birth, Bishop, blog, Blog post, blog posting, Book, China, Chosun Daily Newspaper, Christian, Christian church, Christopher Taylor, church, Classical, Classical era, Classical music, classicalmusic, collective, Collins, color, comfort, complete, composer, Concert, concertize, console, contribute, convention, coronavirus, coronavirus pandemic, Corpus Christi, cost, create, dead, death, deceased, dedicate, dedication, degree, different, difficult, difficult time, diploma, doctoral studies, doctorate, Domenico Scarlatti, Don Giovanni, Early music, energy, era, etude, excited, exciting, expression, Facebook, Facebook post, Facebook posting, Farley's House of Pianos, feast, Feast of All Souls, fee, festival, final, Florida, forward, Franz Liszt, Franz Schubert, funeral march, gender, German, Germany, grief, guest artist, guild, Hanyang University, healing, hear, Home, home website, hope, host, humiity, imformation, impressive, Indiana University, Indonesia, instructor, intend, internationally, Italy, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Jacobi, Johann Sebastian Bach, Kangwoo Jin, Kawai, Kawai PIanos, Korea, layer, layers, lied, like, link, link'share, Liszt, litany, live performance, Ludwig van Beethoven, Luther, Luther Memorial Church, Madison, major key, masterpiece, May, Mead Witter School of Music, Mental health, minor key, Moonlight Sonata, movement, Mozart, multipile, multiple, Music, music critic, music faculty, music professor, Musician, nationally, Newspaper, online, opera, Orchestra, orchestral, pandemic, People, Performer Diploma, photo, photos, Pianist, Piano, piano technician, piece, play, playing, poem, Poetry, polyphonic, polyphony, popular, post, posthumous, posting, powerful, professor, program, program notes, Protestant, public, race, Radio, reach, recital, Robert Schumann, Romantic, Romantic music, Salon Piano Series, sample, Scarlatti, scholarship, Schubert, sense, Seoul, service, service fee, Shanghai, share, simple, Singing, Sonata, song, soothe, soul, Sound, South Korea, special, sponsor, Steve Apps, study, style, suffer, Sunday, Sweet Home, SweetHome, Symphonic Etudes, symphony, tag, Teacher, teaching, Texas A&M, texture, The Ear, theme and variations, thick, ticket, times, tone, Tongji University, touching, tragedy, Tragic, transcription, true, United States, universities, university, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, unprecedented, USA, UW, UW-Madison, UW-River Falls, variation, virtual, virtuosic, vocal music, voice, Website, Wisconsin, wisconsin public radio, Wisconsin State Journal, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, WORT, WORT-FM 89.9, WPR, write, YouTube
Classical music: This Friday at noon, technology meets Beethoven when UW-Madison pianist Kangwoo Jin plays a FREE concerto performance
6 Comments
PLEASE HELP THE EAR. IF YOU LIKE A CERTAIN BLOG POST, SPREAD THE WORD. FORWARD A LINK TO IT OR, SHARE IT or TAG IT (not just “Like” it) ON FACEBOOK. Performers can use the extra exposure to draw potential audience members to an event. And you might even attract new readers and subscribers to the blog.
By Jacob Stockinger
This week’s FREE Friday Noon Musicale — tomorrow, March 6 — at the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive, features an unusual concert in which classical music meets high technology.
Kangwoo Jin (below, in a photo by Steve Apps for the Wisconsin State Journal), a gifted and prize-winning pianist from South Korea, will perform the second and third movements of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 in G major, Op. 58.
But instead of a second piano or a full orchestra, Jin will be accompanied by a newly developed interactive app that adjusts to Jin and allows him to play his solo part flexibly with a real orchestra accompaniment that has been recorded minus the piano part.
Jin is studying for his doctorate with UW Professors Christopher Taylor and Jessica Johnson. He will graduate this May.
Next week Jin — who has won the UW-Madison Concerto and Beethoven Competitions and who teaches at Farley’s House of Pianos, the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music and the UW Continuing Education program– will open and close the UW-River Falls Piano Festival with two performances of the same Beethoven concerto with the St. Croix Valley Symphony Orchestra
Jin suffers from hemophilia and has to be careful about injuring himself from over-practicing and over-playing. He has a fascinating and inspiring personal story to tell. Here is a link to a story about him in the Wisconsin State Journal: https://madison.com/wsj/entertainment/uw-pianist-shares-musical-gift-despite-health-challenge/article_fdba6f0f-9245-5816-a97c-c4f3a6e2d0ed.html
You can follow his Facebook page. And here is a link to Jin’s own website, which has more biographical information and videos: https://www.pianistkangwoojin.com
Jin says that, in addition to the two concerto movements, he will also play several short pieces: “Clair de Lune” (Moonlight) by Claude Debussy; the “Raindrop” Prelude by Chopin; and two song transcriptions by Franz Liszt — Schubert’s “Litany” and Schumann’s “Widmung” (Dedication).
The orchestral accompaniment for the Beethoven concerto is performed by MusAcc — an iPad app. It is an app that can customize and manipulate the audio, much like an actual instrument, in real time. Think of it as an orchestra in a box that you can use anywhere.
Jin explains the reasons for his FUS concert, which starts at NOON (not 12:15 p.m., as it used to be) and goes to about 1 p.m.:
“Playing a concerto is not possible in that venue, so I am using a recorded file for the orchestra part,” Jin says. “My friend Yupeng Gu, who developed this audio controlling device, will conduct and control the pacing of the recording so that the sound synchronizes with my playing. It is quite incredible and will be a very interesting concert.”
“I hope this breaks the barrier of having to have a big venue and other difficulties for performing concertos, and lets local people enjoy a more accessible and diverse repertoire,” he says. “If people like it, I would like to play the whole concerto and maybe more concertos — hopefully, all five Beethoven piano concertos — this way. This is something I have not tried before, so I am excited about it.”
“People have much easier access to solo performances, but not to concertos due to many limitations,” Jin adds. “So I expect them to have a novel experience with this concert.”
In the YouTube video at the bottom, you can hear a similar performance, done with the same device, featuring a different pianist playing the first movement of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 in C Major, Op. 15.
Tags: #BlogPost, #BlogPosting, #Clairdelune, #ClaudeDebussy, #ContinuingEducation, #FacebookPost, #FacebookPosting, #Farley'sHouseofPianos, #FirstUnitarianSocietyofMadison, #FranzLiszt, #FredericChopin, #FridayNoonMusicale, #FullOrchestra, #HighTechnology, #HomePage, #HomeWebsite, #HumanInterest, #InteractiveApp, #JacobS, #JessicaJohnson, #KangwooJin, #LudwigVanBeethoven, #MeadWitterSchoolofMusic, #MusicEducation, #OrchestralAccompaniment, #PianoConcerto, #PianoConcertoNo.4, #PianoFestival, #PianoTranscription, #Prize-Winning, #RaindropPrelude, #RealTime, #RiverFalls, #RobertSchumann, #SouthKorea, #SouthKorean, #St.CroixValleySymphonyOrchestra, #SteveApps, #TheEar, #UniversityofWisconsin, #UniversityofWisconsin-Madison, #UW-RiverFalls, #WisconsinConservatoryofMusic, #WisconsinStateJournal, #YouTubevideo, #YupengGu, accompany, accomplished, acocmpaniment, app, Arts, audience, Audio, Beethoven, biography, blog, Chopin, Clair de Lune, Classical music, Claude Debussy, close, Competition, composer, Concert, concerto competition, concertos, conduct, Continuing Education, control, customize, Debussy, dedication, develop, device, different, doctoral, doctorate, drop, event, Facebook, Farley's House of Pianos, festival, file, first, First Unitarian Society of Madison, flexible, flexibly, forward, Franz Liszt, Frédéric Chopin, free, Friday Noon Musicale, friend, gifted, graduate, Gu, hemophilia, home website, human, human interest, information, injure, instrument, interactive, interesting, intuitive, invent, IPad, Jacob Stockinger, Jessica Johnson, Kangaroo Jin, Korea, like, link, litany, Ludwig van Beethoven, Madison, manipulate, Mead Witter School of Music, meet, minus, moonlight, movement, MusAcc, Music, Music education, open, Orchestra, orchestral accompaniment, pace, pacing, part, perform, performer, personal, Pianist, Piano, Piano Concerto No. 4 (Beethoven), piano festival, playing, possible, post, posting, practicing, Prelude, rain, raindrop, Raindrop Prelude, real, real time, recorded, rehearse, relative, River Falls, Robert Schumann, sample, Schumann, second, share, small, society, solo, South Korea, South Korean, St. Croix Valley Symphony Orchestra, Steve Apps, story, Student, symphony, synchronize, tag, teach, technology, Tempo, The Ear, third, time, transcription, Unitarian, United States, University of Wisconsin, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, unusual, use, UW, UW-Madison, UW-River Falls, venue, Website, win, Wisconsin, Wisconsin Conservatory of Music, Wisconsin State Journal, YouTube, Yupeng, Yupeng Gu
Classical music: Hearing Bach and Haydn on a clavichord proves intimate and revelatory. Plus, a FREE trombone recital is tonight and an organ recital on Sunday afternoon
Leave a Comment
ALERT 1: Tonight at 8 p.m. in Mills Hall, UW-Madison trombonist Mark Hetzler will give a FREE recital with pianist Vincent Fuh. Hetzler will perform a retrospective of pieces he has recorded over the past 14 years, representing five different recordings. Music from the following recordings from his Summit catalogue will be represented in this recital: American Voices (2002); Serious Songs, Sad Faces (2003); 20th Century Architects (2004); Three Views (2012); and Blues, Ballads and Beyond (2015).
Hetzler will repeat this concert on Thursday, Nov. 17 in Fond du Lac, at St. Patrick’s Church, 41 E. Follett Street, as part of the Searl Pickett Chamber Music Series.
For more information go to: http://www.markhetzler.com/
ALERT 2: Tomorrow afternoon, Sunday, Nov. 13, at 4 p.m., Dan Broner, the music director at the First Unitarian Society of Madison, will give a FREE organ recital at the FUS Meeting House, 900 University Bay Drive. The program features the Trio Sonata No. 4 in E minor, “Sleepers Wake!” and the Prelude and Fugue in A major by Johann Sebastian Bach; Prelude, Fugue and Variations by Cesar Franck; and “Dorian Chorale” and “Litanies” by Jehan Alain. Donations will be accepted.
By Jacob Stockinger
Here is a special posting, a review written by frequent guest critic and writer for this blog, John W. Barker. Barker (below) is an emeritus professor of Medieval history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He also is a well-known classical music critic who writes for Isthmus and the American Record Guide, and who hosts an early music show once a month on Sunday morning on WORT-FM 89.9 FM. For years, he served on the Board of Advisors for the Madison Early Music Festival and frequently gives pre-concert lectures in Madison. He also took the performance photos.
By John W. Barker
The clavichord was an instrument of subtle importance in the 18th century. It was a kind of alternative to the harpsichord in several ways. For one, its strings were not plucked, as in a harpsichord, but hammered, as in its descendants, the fortepiano and the subsequent pianoforte or just plain piano.
The clavichord, moreover, was really an instrument for private use, for practice, study and composing work, rather than for concert use, beyond the most intimate of audiences. (You can hear a sample, using J.S. Bach’s Partita No. 2, in a YouTube video at the bottom.)
Local builder and restorer, Tim Farley has made several clavichords before, but this one is a relatively large one. Notable is its incorporation of wood from a number of old pianos, and some rare maple wood that had been submerged in water for a long time. Out of these elements he has created an instrument of great beauty and elegance, as well as of distinctive artistic usefulness.
To introduce this new instrument to Madison’s musical community, Tim and his wife Renee, the reigning royalty of the remarkable Farley’s House of Pianos on the city’s far west side, chose not to do so in their usual salon, as it is too commodious and not noise-free.
Instead, they brought it to the historic Gates of Heaven Synagogue on Sunday afternoon, Nov. 6. A program of four works was played on it by David Schrader (below), an early music specialist who teaches at Chicago’s Roosevelt University.
An audience of about 45 attended. I suspect many were surprised by how tiny (not tinny!) was the instrument’s sound—much more pale than what they would have expected from a harpsichord. Modest as is the Gates of Heaven hall, it was still a bit larger than ideal. Nevertheless, the audience followed the performance intently, and I heard no complaints from anyone afterwards about inaudibility.
The music chosen was entirely from the 18th century. It began with the Partita No. 5 from Johann Sebastian Bach’s Clavierübung or Keyboard Works. On these terms, we heard it as Bach might have played it himself for his own pleasure—or as a student might do for study.
The two middle works were from the other end of the century. An extended Sonata, K. 330, by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart would in its time have been played on the fortepiano, or even harpsichord, and sounded rather pallid this way.
But a two-movement Sonata in G minor by Franz Joseph Haydn, full of introspective feeling, worked well on the clavichord as highly personal expression.
Balancing the opening with J. S. Bach was the closing work, a three-movement Sonata in A minor (Wq49), a relatively early work by Carl Philip Emmanuel Bach, his most influential son. C.P.E. Bach was famous as an expressive player, and for music of inward probing.
I had hoped to hear Schrader demonstrate on this new instrument its feature of Bebung, a capacity for quasi-vibrato quivering on sustained notes that the clavichord’s action famously allowed the player to exploit. There was some of that, but Schrader explained that such an effect did not work on many pitches, limiting its possibilities.
Listeners for whom this type of instrument is unfamiliar surely found this program illuminating, while this instrument’s excellence was a further reminder of what craftsmanship Tim Farley (below, seated at the clavichord he built) has brought to Madison.
Tags: American Record Guide, Arts, Bach, ballads, Baroque, blues, Cesar Franck, Chamber music, Chicago, Chorale, Classical music, clavichord, David Schrader, Dorian, Early music, Farley's House of Pianos, fortepiano, fugue, Gates of Heaven Synagogue, harpsichord, History, Isthmus, Jacob Stockinger, Jehan Alain, Johann Sebastian Bach, John Williams, Keyboard, litanies, litany, Madison, Madison Early Music Festival, Mark Hetzler, Medieval, Mozart, Music, organ, partita, Piano, Prelude, Roosevelt University, Sleeps Wake, Sonata, Trombone, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, variations, Wisconsin, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, wood, WORT-FM 89.9, YouTube
Recent Comments
 | Ronnie on How do post-pandemic concert a… |
 | welltemperedear on How do post-pandemic concert a… |
 | Polly Kuelbs on How do post-pandemic concert a… |
| welltemperedear on How do post-pandemic concert a… |
 | Ann Boyer on How do post-pandemic concert a… |
The Well-Tempered Ear 