Yuja Wang piano recital in London

若き天才ピアニスト，Uja Wng がLondon，Queen Elizabeth Hall のInternational Piano Series で演奏会を開いた音楽評が掲載されていましたので，ご紹介します．

どうも余りの絢爛たる技巧に目が行ってしまって，彼女が紡ぎ出す音楽の内容面に十分目が行き届かなかったのではと思わせる側面があり，かなり批判的な内容ですが，他誌の絶賛記事への揶揄から始めています．

There’s something about young Chinese pianist Yuja Wang that makes normally sane people lose their heads. A recent headline in a music magazine shrieked “Yuja Wang on the verge of world domination”.
She has a blistering technique that has to be seen to be believed, coupled with an insouciant charm. She’s like a force of nature, contained in the body of a smiling slender nymph.

Her performance of Rachmaninov’s Etude-tableau Op 39 no 6 was so fierce that when it was over we all sat dumbfounded. Reaction seemed entirely out of place; it would have felt like applauding a volcano for erupting so splendidly. It was the same with the three Rachmaninov pieces that followed. We were astonished by a phenomenon, rather than wrapped in a musical experience.

it was a perplexing evening, which left me cold. Which was a shame, as it contained some wonderful things. Wang’s uncanny intensity and her sheer ferocity were exactly right for the febrile heat of Scriabin’s 5th Sonata. And there were some lovely liquid moments in the slow movement of Prokofiev’s Sixth Sonata, and a keen sense of its contrapuntal layers. For a moment, one felt real warmth in the air.

It was in the moments when more subtle shades of emotion were needed that things went wrong. Her performance of Beethoven’s wonderful Eb sonata Op 27 was stiff and uncomprehending. It felt as if Wang had placed her performance in a deep freeze to keep it fresh, and forgotten to thaw it out. It was dispiriting, but we live in a culture that loves extremes, and finds the middle ground boring. So the idea that Wang is headed for world domination perhaps isn’t as daft as it sounds.

日本語訳に向かないので，原文のままにしますが，あとはどうぞご自由にご渉猟下さい．
Wang is headed for world domination は彼女ならではの演奏スタイルというべきなのでしょう．　　　

　

 

 

Yuja Wang, Queen Elizabeth Hall, review

Ivan Hewett reviews Yuja Wang at the Queen Elizabeth Hall.

Athletic prowess and emotional chilliness: The pianist Yuja Wang Photo: Felix Broede/Deutsche Grammophon

3:54PM BST 02 May 2012

There’s something about young Chinese pianist Yuja Wang that makes normally sane people lose their heads. A recent headline in a music magazine shrieked “Yuja Wang on the verge of world domination”.

Take a look at her performances of virtuoso showpieces posted on YouTube, and you can see why. She has a blistering technique that has to be seen to be believed, coupled with an insouciant charm. She’s like a force of nature, contained in the body of a smiling slender nymph.

At Tuesday’s recital at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, Wang’s virtuosity was fully on display. But not the charm. She teetered on stage in perilously high heels, stood by the keyboard and stared out with an unseeing gaze and a stiff smile, as if she were about to be presented to royalty. Then she jack-knifed, in a strange parody of a formal bow. If she’d been standing three inches to the left, she would have knocked herself clean out on the piano keyboard.

The music-making had the exactly the same combination of startling athletic prowess and emotional chilliness. Her performance of Rachmaninov’s Etude-tableau Op 39 no 6 was so fierce that when it was over we all sat dumbfounded. Reaction seemed entirely out of place; it would have felt like applauding a volcano for erupting so splendidly. It was the same with the three Rachmaninov pieces that followed. We were astonished by a phenomenon, rather than wrapped in a musical experience.

In all it was a perplexing evening, which left me cold. Which was a shame, as it contained some wonderful things. Wang’s uncanny intensity and her sheer ferocity were exactly right for the febrile heat of Scriabin’s 5th Sonata. And there were some lovely liquid moments in the slow movement of Prokofiev’s Sixth Sonata, and a keen sense of its contrapuntal layers. For a moment, one felt real warmth in the air.

It was in the moments when more subtle shades of emotion were needed that things went wrong. Her performance of Beethoven’s wonderful Eb sonata Op 27 was stiff and uncomprehending. It felt as if Wang had placed her performance in a deep freeze to keep it fresh, and forgotten to thaw it out. It was dispiriting, but we live in a culture that loves extremes, and finds the middle ground boring. So the idea that Wang is headed for world domination perhaps isn’t as daft as it sounds.