Beethoven Focus for 2018-19 season 9/5/18

September 5, 2018

I finally came home yesterday! Huh.. I was away for a long period of time this summer, and it is nice to sleep on my own bed 🙂 Lately I carry my pillow (Japanese small one) on my traveling and it gives me a slight comfort though!

For 2018-19 I will focus on Beethoven including, 1) Piano Concerto No. 2 Op. 19, 2) 3 piano sonatas, Op. 31 No. 3, Op. 53, and Op. 109, 3) 3 cello sonatas, Op. 5 No. 1, Op. 69, and Op. 102 No. 2, 4) piano trio Op. 70 No. 1 “Ghost”, 5) piano quartet Op. 16, 6) variations on the theme of Waldstein for piano 4 hands WoO 67. I am very excited to live with the great, and to perform different genres of his music. I have never performed a half of above program, and have been having a wonderful time learning them. Some people asked “why this year??” .. Of course the big celebration is coming up in 2020 as his 250th birthday! But I won’t wait to celebrate his music. Every year is a celebration and all of us are blessed by his contribution to this world. My programs will include music from his early period to his late period. We must remember that the instrument “piano” was developing during Beethoven’s time, and his writing for piano was changing accordingly. Also we must remember that his hearing was changing gradually. Could we take his hearing loss as negatively or positively? For instance Beethoven wrote Op. 109 without hearing any note. He only heard it in his imagination. Did he write a same music if he could hear it? That would be an interesting imagination for us to think. There will be a lot to think and imagine this year!

You can find the details of the concert dates in this website.