Yuja Wang is solo recitalist of the year

Yuja Wang is solo recitalist of the year

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norman lebrecht

October 02, 2019

In the 2019 Gramophone awards.

Concerto soloist of the year is Bertrand Chamayou.

Couldn’t be a bigger contrast.

 

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I am honored to have won this year’s Gramophone Award for “The Berlin Recital.” This album is very dear to my heart, and everyone who knows me, knows that I find the Russian repertoire endlessly inspiring and thrilling to play. It’s an album with lots of colors and many intriguing journeys. A recital is perhaps the most personal recording a pianist can make and I am so grateful to the Gramophone family for this award. I want to also take a moment and thank my label Deutsche Grammophon for always supporting me, and for making my artistic vision of a recording a reality. I love playing in Berlin and I am happy we chose to make the recording there. It’s incredibly special to have a recital program recorded live at one of the world’s greatest halls. It gives the music an exhilaration energy and it brings a very different vitality than a studio recording. I wanted to bring that vibe to the listeners at home, and to replicate the experience of being there as closely as possible with this recording. Once again a big thank you to Gramophone Magazine, and also my fantastic fan community for joining me on my musical journey. 📷 Julia Wesely @gramophonemagazine @dgclassics #theberlinrecital

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Up to the vineyard 🍇 @tsinandaliestate

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Comments

  • Alexander says:

    it couldn’t have happened to a nicer woman, could it 😉

  • anon says:

    Showing off her, asset, that made her recitalist of the year.

    She’s a well-rounded artist.

  • 18mebrumaire says:

    Brilliant technique! She can open the piano lid with her neck. Could Schnabel do that?

  • batonbaton says:

    Seeing that asset brings me almost as much pleasure as hearing her play the piano 🙂

  • Karl says:

    Nice pics! She’s going to be in Boston this week. I wonder what she’s wear! I’ll report back.

  • Rgiarola says:

    L2 would be a greater contrast to Chamayo. She is naturally cool, in fact. Lololololo

  • artea says:

    Yuja is a great virtuosa pianist. The blurb at the top is however a bit silly.

    The DG recording presents the Berlin concert badly. It’s far from complete. Yuja is partly about the encores and all of them were left off the cd. They were (maybe still are) available separately for download.

    DG recorded the wrong concert of the tour. Berlin got only 5 encores; the Barbican got 7:

    Mendelssohn, Song without words in F sharp minor, Op.67 no.2
    Prokofiev, Toccata in D minor, Op.11
    Rachmaninoff, Vocalise, Op. 34 Nr. 14
    Bizet/Horowitz, Carmen Variations
    Liszt, Gretchen am Spinnrade, D 558 no. 8 (transcribed from Schubert D 118)
    Chopin, Waltz no. 7 in C sharp minor, Op.64 no.2
    Prokofiev, Klaviersonate Nr. 7 in B-Dur, Op.83: Precipitato.

    Even Carnegie Hall only got 6. DG of course wouldn’t do a record entitled the Barbican Recital. DG missed out – and so did the record-buying public. Yuja was obviously happier at the Barbican! Seven encores are a lot – especially as there’s always the risk she might stumble continually going off- and back on-stage in heels. A wonderful concert, but not in Berlin so not on DG.

    • Saxon Broken says:

      I saw her perform in a very long dress and high heels. And she tripped over her dress when coming on to play the encore. Perhaps that is why she normally doesn’t wear those kind of clothes.

  • Karin.Becker3@gmx.de says:

    A wonderful photo: It shows the modern face of classical music: A Chinese-American butt

  • Greg Bottini says:

    Lots of smarmy comments about Yuja’s appearance, as usual.
    You guys/gals focusing on nothing but her body (which, by the way, IS beautiful, and a publicist’s dream – THAT’S why there are all those photos) should get a life and start appreciating what a truly great musician she is.
    Congratulations, Yuja – you deserve the honor!

  • Will Duffay says:

    “Couldn’t be a bigger contrast.”

    What is it about this immensely successful, critically rated, hugely talented, vastly industrious, glamorous Chinese woman that gets my fellow men so upset and snipy? It’s strange.

    • Karin Becker says:

      A complex question. Wang, like Lang Lang, is a pin-up pianist (a word from an interview with E. Kissin), which means they both want attention, both put their ego over the music. Both are immature in their personality. Wang has made her clothes, which some find glamorous, a trademark that should also provoke. Her concert clothing is exceptionally tasteless, vulgar, vulgar. She undresses instead of
      she apparently wants to violate the rules of decency, and gives that as freedom and as an attempt to modernize by borrowing from pop singers like Rihanna the dusty in their eyes classic world through displayed sexiness and near-nudity.
      A primitive method: Since time immemorial, young women should take off their clothes to be successful. A proven method: People speak and write about them, the annually over one hundred concerts on almost every continent and especially their distribution through Youtube are known. Not musical performance is important, but the response to Instagram. Without Youtube, Wang and her management would have to resort to other marketing methods. The question is, how long can this be? Soon there is nothing left to take off. From serious, important pianists like Argerich, Leonskaja, Silberstein remain musical achievements, with Wang one becomes, male admirers in 20 years maybe only the high heels, the bare thighs and the swing of her butt remember

      • pageturner says:

        You are rather harsh on her, and me for that matter. Yes, I am male, but not in my 20s, yes she has a nice ass, but when I hear her play I pay attention to her music, not her ass, thighs or anywhere else. Yuja Wang is herself and confident to be so, just as Zilberstein et al are too. The world can accommodate both – if you don’t like one, then don’t listen to her or his music or tear them to shreds publicly. Leave the hard working musician alone. Thank you.

    • Rgiarola says:

      I said L2 (Lang Lang) would be a greater contrast. So it is clear that my opinion isn’t based on gender. Please, take me out of your point that seems to be based only on it.
      Poor L2, he suffers a lot of jokes from the ones that believes he is only hype, and cannot blame the joker as chauvinist. Perhaps he uses another similar assertion, saying it is prejudice about Chinese. However, I think the same about the “artistry” of Dudamel and I’m latin and male as much as him.
      Please, try to accept the fact that others perhaps just dislike, the artistic think you appreciate. There isn’t any evil on it, mostly of the time. It is just a case of limitation of your capabilities to admit differences of opinion.

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