Asian Pianists

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The Keyboard Trade
By DANIEL J. WAKIN
The NY Times
August 14, 2005

The classical piano talent bubbling out of China is no
longer a secret. Witness Lang Lang and Yundi Li, emerging
stars with big careers. So it may be no surprise that the
winner of the Cleveland International Piano Competition on
Aug. 6 was the Chinese pianist Chu-Fang Huang, 23, or that
Ms. Huang was a finalist at this year's Van Cliburn
competition, along with Sa Chen, 25, also of China, who won
third prize. More revealing, perhaps, was that 8 of the 35
competitors in the Cliburn were from China, the most of any
country.

And more: 10 of the 25 students of Veda Kaplinsky,
chairwoman of Juilliard School's piano department, are
Chinese.
Gary Graffman, president of the Curtis Institute of Music in
Philadelphia, had three students, all Chinese, last year.
One, Yuja Wang, is already managed by International Creative
Management.

Mr. Graffman said: "You have 1.3 billion people in China. It
seems like they are all starting piano or violin. It's a
little like the Jews of Eastern Europe." For them in the
past, he said, music careers were a way out of the ghetto;
similarly, many Chinese families in the growing middle class
see music as a ticket to the West, he said.

Why the explosion of Chinese talent? "The main answer seems
to be the kind of discipline the parents instill in their
kids and the degree of importance they attach to classical
music, which is pretty much nonexistent in this country,"
Ms. Kaplinsky said. "Perhaps it's the result of being
forbidden fruit for so long." She also noted the immense
community and government support.

Long hours of practice also give Chinese pianists a boost in
competitions, where the stress is intense. "When you put
them under pressure," Ms. Kaplinsky said, "they hold up
better than most people do."

[ Cliburn competition monitors will remember
Vera Kaplinsky's influence there. ]

=== End of article ===

Now, is that all? A ticket to the west? A chase after a long forbidden fruit? How about simply the love for music? With the globalization, really, western traditional music will not be the dominating or the so call higher class performing art form. Many cultures, including Chinese, has their own ancient highly developed music. The different sound of the world will take over the domination of the traditional western music. In fact, personally, I love Chinese instruments, Chinese Opera, and many other form of Chinese Arts, in fact, I would probably have a much better time pursuing that than trying to stay in the traditional Western Classical music business, yet, why do I keep trying no matter how hard it is? Because I love it. As simple as that. So, don't make any statements like that before you really understand why we do it. It is degrading the Western Music. If I want a ticket to the west long ago, I would listen to my parents, discontinue the piano playing, and go get my degree in either computer science, double E, medical, bio/tech research or even accounting. Those will really give me the ticket into great school with full scholarship, rather than working so hard to compete with many pianists (especially the fellow Asians) for so little amount of scholarship fund. So, please, don't be such a hypocrite. That really makes me mad!!!!