The 13th China Music Golden Bell Awards Piano Competition No. 1 Sun Qilin
Text | Sun Qilin
Stage is the best standard for testing the performance of works.
is not what I said, it is what pianist Perahia said in front of all our piano students when he visited Juilliard School in the fall of 2012. That year, when I first arrived in New York, I saw this grand pianist who could only be seen on the cover of a best-selling CD. I was so excited that I couldn't say anything. That day he taught in the concert hall on the ground floor of Julia. Someone asked during the after-class Q&A session, curious about how an amazing pianist like him prepared a work on weekdays. Pelesia held her glasses and replied without thinking: "Stage, go on stage! (go on stage!)" He told us that when he was preparing to record the full set of Mozart piano concertos, each concerto was only recorded after countless tours from all over the country. "We never rush to record the progress. We must play the concert first and then start recording." He explained, for some reason, the stage is such a magical place. Many problems will only be exposed in the process of facing the audience. Only after experiencing the baptism of the stage can you have a deeper understanding and control of the work.
In October 2021, I was very fortunate to win the first place in the piano group at the 13th China Music Golden Bell Awards. After the game, facing reporters from all over the country, I was always asked about the preparations for the Golden Bell Awards and what can I share with you. My mind suddenly echoed what Perehia once warned us: go on stage more! The stage is the best standard for testing the performance of a work.
Piano performance is an extremely complex and requires extremely high concentration. It combines mental and physical strength. Just as athletes need to adjust their competitive state to the best level through warm-up matches, performers also need to constantly test the shortcomings of their works through experience on stage one by one. More importantly, when you walk on the stage, with the natural physiological adrenaline soaring, how to integrate the physical technical support and brain concentration together to avoid being unable to do so, you need to go through continuous practical exercises to get close to the ideal state of ease.
Chinese Music Golden Bell Award represents the highest level of Chinese music. I naturally dare not take it lightly for such a high-standard competition. In the first two months of the Golden Bell competition, I frequently walked on the stage to play live in front of the audience. During the preparation process, Sichuan Conservatory of Music held many exhibitions for the contestants, which benefited me a lot. My instructor Professor Wang Yan also visited every concert of my personal concert to help me constantly adjust my performance to better.
The three words "on the stage" are simple to say, but in fact they have great considerations. I can divide it into three parts: before going to the stage, before going to Taichung, and after going to the stage.
Stage 1: Before taking the stage
Before taking the stage, the stage may be the most decisive, most painful, and most unpredictable period of hardship. Anyone who has had live performance can empathize with it. This stage can be one month ago, one week ago, two days ago, the night before, when we warm up on stage, and even more 15 minutes before. What we do, think, see, and hear in this stage seems to have a tangible or intangible impact on the subsequent performance like a devil.
The great figure in the music industry, the great pianist Horowitz returned to the stage in 1965 after 12 years of retirement. In his later memoirs, he said that when the door to Carnegie Music Hall in New York opened, the black piano seemed like a solemn coffin that was about to dominate his fate. Even the amazing Horowitz sighed so much, let alone us mortals?
From my personal perspective, the most important part before going on stage is to do the work that should be done solidly and perfectly during the preparation stage. The more thorough the technical requirements of the repertoire are, the more comprehensive the music is expressed, the safer the player will be in his heart and the smoother the stage will be.During the piano practice stage, I usually don’t think too much about what will happen on stage. I just focus on the present, think about what problems we need to solve now, and what is the most scientific and effective method to solve the problem. I also require myself to concentrate on the piano practice rather than be aimless and subconsciously. This will also train myself to a certain extent to focus on music in actual performance. The so-called journey of a thousand miles is accumulated in a single step. We should divide any difficult work into small specific goals to complete one by one, give ourselves specific instructions every day to solve specific problems, rather than worrying about playing on stage too early and consuming ourselves in anxiety and anxiety all day long. Treat your daily piano practice with a positive and honest attitude, regardless of the final result, the preparation process will be greatly rewarded. The closer the performance is to the
, the more sensitive you become, and a little bit of turbulence will cause trouble. What you need most at this time is to keep a normal mind. When I was in college at Juilliard , I tossed and turned and couldn’t sleep well the night before taking professional courses. For me at that time, taking professional courses was the cruelest test, which directly determined my emotional quality throughout the week. As I grow up little by little, whenever important performances approach, I will naturally keep myself calm - not the calmness of artistic expression, but the calmness of my mind. Try to slow down the pace of doing things, keep your daily life organized, practice yoga for a walk, and slowly transition your emotional changes. On the day I went on stage, I would sleep lazy, eat and drink enough, and practice the piano a little, and use it as a warm-up instead of over-consuming my energy. The more you need to express yourself, the more you need to take the ability to absorb. Therefore, as long as you ensure your body is opened before going on stage, I will focus more on restoring energy.
Concert Hall backstage is an interesting place, with warm yellow light shining on rows of bright mirrors, revealing all our fragility, insignificance and anxiety. German philosopher Nietzsche once said a famous saying in "The Other Side of Good and Evil": "If you fight with an evil dragon for too long, you will become an evil dragon; if you stare at the abyss for too long, you will look back and stare back." Instead of being entangled with your own anxiety, it is better to accept it. Today, I feel my heartbeat in the backstage from time to time, and turn this familiar physiological condition into a kind of comfort, allowing me to tease myself, "Oh, I'm going to go on stage, I'm very excited!" I will try to guide myself to accept it calmly and feel it, so as to resolve it. Excessive interpretation of the word "tough" brings unnecessary negative emotions. Controllable tension in enthusiasm often enhances people's expressiveness on the stage, and I believe many people have this experience.
Stage 2: Go on stage
door opens, applause sounds, walk on the stage, bow, sit on the piano bench, what are you thinking at this time?
I discussed this issue with my friend Kate Liu (third winner of the 2015 Warsaw Chopin International Piano Competition). Her performances can always touch the softest part of the audience's hearts. Listening to her music is like listening to a story, telling it with endless aftertaste. Once, she and I sat in the Lincoln Center auditorium to listen to the concert. The lights went out and the concert was about to begin. I turned around and asked her, "If you were the performer tonight, what were you thinking at this time?" She smiled and said, "All I think is, my god, I'm done!" After the joke, she told me meaningfully that she would consciously put herself in the atmosphere of the work she was about to perform, and combine it with the temperament required for music. After that, I would invite her to listen to me walking on the stage in many personal concerts. Whenever I ask her what else I need to pay attention to now, she always says, "Think more about the beginning of the first work you are going to play tonight, put yourself into the mood of the music, and penetrate it." Every round of the
Golden Bell Awards, I tell myself to play it as a concert, put aside the distractions of competition, integrate into music, and enjoy music.The moment I sit on the stool, I will try to put myself into a bubble of musical atmosphere, and my heart is soft and my whole body is surrounded by music. The sound in the inner ear is subtle, imagining delicately the sound that is about to touch the key. During the performance, regardless of the on-site environment, it is a very important step to devote yourself to the roles required by the repertoire. Just like an actor’s dress-up, we need to always make ourselves a specific character, block everything around us, and immerse ourselves in the bubble of music. Only in this way can all emotional output appear sincere and moving. At the same time, what is more important and difficult to achieve is to combine subjective ideas with objective reality on the stage to achieve a wonderful balance. Leon Fleisher (Leon Fleisher) once said that there should be three people playing piano, one is doing the piano playing activity, one is imagining the sound before making a sound, and the third person puts his ear in the concert hall to check whether the sound being played is the same as before. If not, tell the person playing to make adjustments. To achieve that these three people perform their duties and cooperate properly, what they need is the experience of constantly working on the stage again and again.
The third stage: After the end,
song ended. After receiving the applause and flowers, we came to the third stage. This stage is generally easier, and given that the most difficult part has ended, there is always a feeling of relief. After playing a concert, I usually do not immediately make rational assessments or criticisms of the performance just now, but focus more on my own feelings, physiological and psychological. Today on stage, my muscles feel very released, or are they tighter? Are you very rich in inner activities or relatively stable? Do you have the courage to make some improvisational performances, or are you more stable overall? ...This feeling is only true when I recall it at the first time, so often when I walk to the dressing room as soon as I get off the stage, I will try my best to capture my state on the stage and record the situation of " book I " when facing the stage. If I get off the stage and get excited, such as successfully doing a lot of things on stage that I never dare to try when practicing piano off stage (this is the most wonderful moment of live performance), or fully presenting everything I want to express, then I will try my best to embrace this kind of victory-so that I can continue to emulate this state in my future performance. I believe that successful cases on the stage are more worth cherishing than those that are not ideal, because we can do it once and try to do it a second time. By analogy, affirming oneself with this positive encouragement mechanism will prompt an individual's playing state to become more and more courageous.
After almost three days, I will sit back and evaluate the advantages or problems reflected in the actual performance. At this time, it is best if there is live video. Of course, it is always difficult to listen to my own recordings. I used to be unable to listen to my performance for a long time. After a long period of inner struggle, I can now objectively evaluate it from the perspective of a third party while listening to my own recordings. The reason why this step is necessary is that we on the stage will deceive ourselves from time to time and use the spotlight to try our best to package ourselves. For example, the sounds you hear on the stage are different from those fed back to the audience; due to the personal inner situation, there will be error judgments on the length of time; or when facing large-scale repertoire, we are limited by the essence and it is difficult to truly have a good grasp of the structure of the work during the performance. As the saying goes, we do not know the true face of Mount Lu because we are in this mountain. So, whenever I completely withdraw from the player's identity and evaluate my performance as a bystander, the results often surprise me. The greater this confusion, the deeper I understand my performance, more comprehensively my interpretation of the stage, and finally more confident in my grasp of the work.
stage is the best standard for testing the performance of works. It is a catchy motto, but it is actually a dangerous peak covered with thorns.No matter how difficult and dangerous the process is, whenever I talk to the audience through the notes flowing with my fingertips in the concert hall, the satisfaction and beauty are enough to support me to step onto the stage again and again in the future with more certainty. After all, music performers need a strong heart. This big heart contains the determination to persevere in overcoming difficulties, the ambition to be insatiable for art, the curiosity to expect everything in the world, and the love for truth, goodness and beauty. May we all love the stage, love music, and love this touch that can only be aroused in the concert hall.
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