Author: VRS
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PARKING AT THE CHAN CENTRE
Many of our patrons have pointed out the increasing cost of using the Rose Garden Parkade adjacent to the Chan Centre. In the past, parking at UBC was underwritten by UBC Parking Services with a small charge ($1-$1.50) applied to organizations using the Chan Centre for each ticket that was sold. UBC Parking absorbing the…
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THE REMARKABLE CAREER OF GEORGE LI
And what a career it has been for this 15 year old pianist! George Li began winning competitions at age 6 and he made is first public performance at Boston Steinway Hall at the age of nine. One of his biggest achievements came in 2010 when he performed Chopin’s Piano Concerto no. 1 with the…
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LISTENING ROOM
One thing we all share in common is a passion for listening to music. Of course, we regularly come together to discover new talent and marvel at internationally-acclaimed artists on Vancouver’s stages. But our appetite for music does not end there. In a world where recordings have never been more readily available, we can now…
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A GROWING APPRECIATION: PRELUDES AND FUGUES BY SHOSTAKOVICH
Perhaps it has been a deficiency in my musical education, but I have found it hard to warm to Shostakovich’s Preludes and Fugues. Written in 1950-51 and influenced by Bach and in a lineage of prelude collections by Chopin, Scriabin, Busoni, Debussy, and Rachmaninoff, these works have generally remained on the outskirts of the repertoire.…
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PROGRAM NOTES: SHOSTAKOVICH PRELUDES AND FUGUES
Dmitri Shostakovich: 12 Preludes and Fugues from Op. 87 Like many of the great composers before him (Bach, Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Liszt and Rachmaninoff, among others), Shostakovich possessed the skills of a keyboard virtuoso, and might well have sustained a successful career as such. Among his prizes was one from the First International Chopin…
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GETTING TO KNOW: JUHO POHJONEN
“I receive something valuable through music – and I hope that each listener will feel that they have too.” On his music education: “I started to play violin in a children’s music school at the age of two-and-a-half. My brother – now also a professional pianist and a composer – was already studying piano at…
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GETTING TO KNOW: SIMON KEENLYSIDE
“I am a story teller, I am a narrator.” “I spend my entire working life dealing only with beauty; I rarely sing with a piece of music in front of me, so all of these beautiful songs are committed to memory.” Performing opera does not come without its risks: injuring his back in one…
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GETTING TO KNOW: MAXIM RYSANOV
“If they say the violin is a human voice, I would say the viola is the voice of the soul.” Discovery: “I studied at the boarding school, and there was a viola player in the next room. Its vibrations touched me deeply when I played it. That was how I realized that I can…
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A PASSING THOUGHT
Our 32nd season opened this past Sunday with the Russian-born, Israeli-based pianist Boris Giltburg. He may be young (27 years), and he may not be a household name, but he left no doubt he is an artist to watch. The buzz in the lobby at intermission was great: one woman described to me his ‘magic fingers’…
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RU35: RECITALS FOR YOUNG VANCOUVERITES
Ru35 is a new program for discerning young Vancouverites between 18 and 35 who want to broaden their cultural horizons, impress a date or influence their network in a new way. Young adults get the opportunity to experience live solo performances by world-class classical artists, meet new people, and never break the bank doing it.…