Nagano’s daughter: I hated practising the piano
mainThe pianist Karin Kei Nagano, 22, is bringing out her third recording on the Canadian label Analekta.
Daughter of the conductor Kent Nagano and the pianist Mari Kodama, she was put to the piano at age three and made her debut in a Mozart concerto when she was just eight years old.
She doesn’t sound too happy about that: ‘Until I was eleven or twelve, I actually hated practicing, I thought it was terrible… But a short time later, maybe I was 14, I realized that only persistence and perseverance really lead to a high level. She adds: ‘I had a pretty strict daily schedule and my parents attached great importance to a basic cultural education.’
Karin has just graduated from Yale in architecture and is settling into her first job with a design firm.
Playing since 8 and earning her life outside music, very clever. Most of us will have to take a similar path very soon, willingly or not.
A 1%er.
Would she have gotten any album without her last name?
Who *can’t* put out an album these days?
Quite!
An erroneous and unattributed article at Wikipedia says she won the Arthur Rubinstein Piano competition (there is no footnote for this). But she is not among the winners from its official website: International https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Rubinstein_International_Piano_Master_Competition
Winner of the First Prize at the Paris International Scriabin Competition at the age of 9 is also quite an unfootnoted achievement.
fflambeau The article in question says that she won first prize at the Rubinstein International Piano Competition in 2009-2010. No mention of Arthur. Of course this is terribly misleading, but she would have been all of eleven years old at the time, and I think that we would have heard more about it if it was indeed the Arthur Rubinstein competition. I did happen to see that there is an Anton Rubinstein Competition in Düsseldorf for musicians 8-15 years old. More likely it was that one.
Arthur Rubenstein played the piano and famously so.
fflambeau – https://www.rubinstein-akademie.de/en/wettbewerbe_neu/
is probably meant.
The juxtaposition of Schubert and Messiaen on her album is curious and potentially illuminating.
or maybe that’s what she practiced
Well, the choice to practice Schubert and Messiaen is, in itself, an indication of an individual approach to the instrument and repertoire.
The one composer wrote all the notes that the other carefully left-out.
See.
You don’t have to be a certain color to be privileged.
Sometimes I wish this blog had a filter function for readers who prefer to not be bothered by posts which include the terms “Nagano,” “Parra,” or “Axelrod.”
you can add “Mirga” to that list! Please!
Sign me up, pul-eeze.
It is not necessary to have a famous parent forcing you to practice the piano against your inclination. I also hated practicing the piano, all by myself.
Should have concentrated on spelling.
She is her father’s daughter, and this is her third recording. It wouldn’t be hard for her to be a better musician than he is. Yes, she is smart enough to have another career, much to her credit, and she’s better looking than him too. Interesting juxtaposition of repertoire on this disc.
What a carpingly shallow comment. The glass in your world is permanently half full. Sad.
She began studying medicine at university but ended up an architecture grad. That should tell you something.
“Reincarnation” is the title, a good start would be to reincarnate with a different last name.
Just my observation, but I find Asian parents put a greater importance on their children’s education and cultural upbringing than black or Hispanic parents. My Mexican gardener, for example, tells his son to go do gigs with him instead of going to college.
Asians are, in general, more civilised because they are more traditional. They don’t get the feeling that if something is old, it has to be thrown away for that very reason. Precious things are preserved, and learned from. This hangs together with the suspicion that Asians are a bit more intelligent than Westerners.
Mr. Borstlap, you can do better than responding to the idiotic comment by JussiB who may or may not have a Mexican gardener but who definitely has a lot of BS.
I have in fact several investment properties and employ a Mexican gardener and a Peruvian handyman.
The Peruvians are the best.
We have here a bunch of Syrian fugitives doing the gardens & wow how good they are! and happy people as well, on fridays after prayer they make a big party to which all staff is invited. Life has become so much better now. Never hire locals, go for the foreigners!
Sally
My notion is that Asian families put more emphasis on “success” especially economic “success” meaning money.
And good old Norman is protesting against rigged piano juries. Here is someone who is rigging the whole notion of piano competitions and who won them.
She should become an architect and give up piano as a career. The Nagano name would be a handicap.
His other daughter Nancy, found a practical solution: turning her family name around to Onagan, and became a famous librarian.