Early Music America Winter 2013 - (Page 19)
I
-Tamara Bernstein
ACD2 2404
ATMA PRESENTS
THE FIFTH VOLUME
OF THE RECORDING
OF THE SACRED
CANTATAS
OF J.S. BACH
MONIKA MAUCH SOPRANO
FRANZISKA GOTTWALD ALTO
CHARLES DANIELS TENOR
HARRY VAN DER KAMP BASS
MONTRÉAL BAROQUE
Eric Milnes CONDUCTOR
About the previously released
Bach Sacred Cantatas on ATMA:
Baroque,
"Milnes, Montréalnothing but
and ATMA deliver
unmitigated pleasure.
Enlightening!"
SACD2 2403
SACD2 2401
- Classics Today USA
SACD2 2400
faculty ensemble rehearse for their first
concert. "People were listening to each
other and constantly interacting, rather
than following instructions," she says.
While at Juilliard, Zhu decided to
audition for the viola da gamba solo in
the aria "Komm, süßes Kreuz" in Bach's
St. Matthew Passion, even though gamba
was still quite new to her at the time.
She ended up performing it-and playing the solo continuo cello-on tour
with the Juilliard 415 Ensemble, under
the direction of Masaaki Suzuki. Zhu
describes this as one of the highlights of
her time at Juilliard, characteristically
deflecting attention to her colleagues
and stressing the inspiration she got
from them. Mealy recalls that her performance of the piece on that tour, "and
in every performance since then, has
been one of the great highlights of the
evening. It's a ferociously difficult piece
for the player, and she really transcends
its technical challenges to make it
something very deep.
"I think people respond to Beiliang's
music-making so immediately because
it's just like herself," Mealy continued.
"She's a very centered, loving person,
totally unpretentious, extremely smart
(she was the one who would casually
solve everyone's theory problems at
Juilliard-'Oh, just put an E there')
and very humble, always eager to learn
and grow."
Zhu has subsequently reprised her
double role in the St. Matthew Passion
with the Philadelphia Orchestra. In
October 2013, she played gamba for the
New York recital debut of British soprano
Carolyn Sampson at Carnegie's Weill
Recital Hall; in November, she is giving a
solo recital in Seoul, Korea. Her 2014
agenda includes a recital at the Bach
Festival in Leipzig in June.
"For me, performing is a way of living,
not just a way of earning a living," she
says. "The time you spend on stage is
always a special time; with different
audiences, the same pieces become different every time. You can sense the
audience; it becomes a dialogue without
words. I'm very grateful for that."
SACD2 2402
recent interview. She began playing cello
at the age of four at the Shanghai Music
Kindergarten. Her teacher throughout
childhood, Ms. Xuping Zou, "always
emphasized the importance of listening
to music outside of the cello repertoire,
and other arts-operas and ballets, for
instance," Zhu said.
Zhu has been playing the Bach Suites
for unaccompanied cello since she was
six years old. "He is the composer closest to my heart," she says. But that was
pretty much it for Baroque music when
she was growing up; there was certainly
no historical performance movement
for European music in Shanghai. As a
schoolgirl, though, she did play cello in a
traditional music orchestra, surrounded
by traditional Chinese instruments. "Perhaps that planted ancient sounds in my
head," she says.
Zhu remembers the precise moment
when she realized she loved Baroque
music. She was 12 years old and the TV
was tuned to a channel that played European classical music while showing
scenes from Europe. A piece of music
so bowled her over that she looked up
the telephone number of the television
station and phoned to ask what it was.
The composer turned out to be
Telemann.
The son of Zhu's teacher had studied
cello at Eastman with Steven Doane and
had sent back enthusiastic reports. In
2005, Zhu won a scholarship from Eastman, where she flourished under
Doane's guidance and was able to pursue her love of Baroque music with Paul
O'Dette and Christel Thielmann.
After graduating from Eastman in
2009, Zhu enrolled in the first cohort of
the Juilliard School's historical performance program. There, "another part of
the sky opened up to me," she said. In
that first year, the teacher-student ratio
"was almost one-to-one," Zhu said, and
the pressure to make the program succeed brought further excitement and
intensity.
At Juilliard, Zhu's teachers and coaches included some of the most accomplished and characterful musicians in
the field, such as cellist Phoebe Carrai,
gambist Sarah Cunningham, and violinist Monica Huggett. Zhu's first revelation
at Juilliard came when she watched the
atm aclassique.com
STUDIO
QUALITY
MP3
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Tamara Bernstein writes on music and
programs the free summer concerts at
the Toronto Music Garden.
Early Music America
Winter 2013
19
http://www.atmaclassique.com
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Early Music America Winter 2013
Editor's Note
Reader Forum
Sound Bytes
Musings: Time Traveling with Instruments
Profile: Pure Gold: Beiliang Zhu
Recording Reviews
Let's put on a... Zarzuela!
A Banquet of Music 40 Years in the Serving
Honoring Krebs
Book Reviews
Ad Index
In Conclusion: Dido and Aeneas Reconsidered
Early Music America Winter 2013
http://www.brightcopy.net/allen/EMAM/22-1
http://www.brightcopy.net/allen/EMAM/21-4
http://www.brightcopy.net/allen/EMAM/21-3
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/21-2
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/21-1
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/20-4
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/20-3
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/20-2
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/20-1
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/19-4
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/19-3
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/19-2
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/19-1
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/18-4
https://www.nxtbook.com/allen/EMAM/18-3
https://www.nxtbookmedia.com