August 8, 10am. Music@Menlo: Carte Blanche Concert IV: Found in Translation

Music@Menlo: Carte Blanche Concert IV: Found in Translation

It's been a while: a mid-summer night's story

It's been a while since my last post. It's about 1230am now, but summer is going by so fast that I suddenly felt the need to jot the first part of it down.
This is a wonderfully hectic summer. Six festivals, a Rachmaninov Solo CD for Signum, a three-week long tour of Japan, a couple of recitals and a concerto performance are just the musical part of this crazy summer. Lucille and I also sold our condo in New York last month and just moved to a brand new one fives blocks away. Two separate trips to Asia and two to Europe are somehow providing me with lots of hours of much needed mental rest on the plane. As it happens,  I had to fly from Wales to NYC for two nights to close on our sale and move all our belongings (including two pianos!) to storage, then went on to my Japan tour and three weeks later started rehearsals in Fort Worth. Lucille managed among many difficulties, and performances (including a Mozart recording for Universal) to close on our purchase of the new condo AND move in during her two day stay in New York. She then joined me to the Mimir Chamber Festival in Fort Worth. We just got back to NYC and are unpacking. It's really exciting. I am looking forward to lots of dinner parties.

I was really happy to be back at beautiful Schloss Elmau, in Bavaria for the second time.  It is really heaven on earth! This time I put together  three concerts with Lucille, and my friends (and amazing musicians) Nicolas Alstaedt and Joseph Lin. We really had a great time playing wonderful music, enjoying the spectacular surroundings and taking full advantage of the most beautiful spa I have ever seen. Highly recommended!

I am really excited also about the new Rachmaninov recording for Signum Records. We chose the beautiful facilities at Wyastone, in Wales, for this project, and I couldn't have been happier. My producer Anna Barry and Mike Hatch were their amazing selves. I feel so lucky to have had the opportunity to work with them on my last three recordings, starting with Warner Classics' Baroque Reflections. It went so well that we finished the recording early. I can't wait to hear the final edit, and for the  recording to be out next year! It will feature the complete preludes op. 23, quite a few transcriptions (including my own version of Vocalise), and a rarity: some charming student works by Rachmaninov.

I then moved out of our old place and  I got ready for the long tour in Japan with violinist Sayako Kusaka, an old friend from my SMU, who is now concertmaster of the Berlin Konzerthaus Orchestra.  We played three programs, including my first ever Franck Sonata (!) among other things. But the highlight of the tour for me was performing  Busoni's amazing Second Violin Sonata. It is such a special, unique and powerful work, and it was a pleasure to perform it in such great concert halls and on great pianos with her.
I thing I have probably been to Japan about 15-20 times, but this summer I finally had time to visit Tsukiji, Tokyo's famous fish market for the first time. Our tour manager picked us up at 330am to be in line for the tuna auction at 4. It was really an amazing experience. Of course the 6am  sushi omakase at the market was the best part! I also had the opportunity to visit the beautiful city of Nara, Japan's oldest, and to meet a lot of warm people all over Japan. All in all it was a great trip, and a very unusual one, since  I had a bit of free time and met with a few friends while in Tokyo! I have to confess that Tokyo has become over the years one of my favorite destinations. I can't wait to go back!

A yearly summer appointment, the Mimir Festival in Fort Worth, followed Japan right away. This was a fun year, as I was playing two amazing works. Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time (it was my first performance ever!) and Korngold's Suite for two violins, cello and piano left hand alone! Mimir is always a lot of fun, and after about ten years, I feel like I know a lot of the audience, and that we are all a big family. 

Now, I am back in NYC, in my beautiful new home, and with Lucille. Off to Westport, CT, for a four hand concert with Lucille on July 24th , then back home and off to Menlo for my debut at the wonderful Music@Menlo Festival. At that point, musically, I will only be half way through my summer. It's going to be a long and wonderful one!

Carte Blanche at Music@Menlo

I was asked to come up with a Carte Blanche recital concept for this summer's Music@Menlo Festival. Coming up with a three-part recital spanning from Bach to Berio was a very interesting process for me. The concert will take place on August 8th, and will start at 10 am at the Stent Family Hall, at Menlo School.
For more info check out the Festival page for the concert.
I was also asked to write some extensive program notes on this Carte Blanche. Feel free to read them here!
Now back to New Jersey, with the second of the four "Best of" concerts which will see me and Lucille performing a variety of concertos with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra and their new music director Jacques Lacombe!

My fastest and shortest version of BWV 846

Click HERE to see the AMEX commercial!!!

Mid-travel

I'm now at AA's flagship lounge in Miami at the beginning of a month-long "outing". I was lucky enough to spend last week playing at the Aruba International Piano Festival. The name says it all. Lucille joined me and played for  the first few concerts but had to leave a couple of days ago to play Saint-Saens' Second Concerto in Toronto. The rehearsal and performing schedule was supposed to be quite relaxed but because of Eyjafjallajökull (yes, I copied and pasted that)  things became quite hectic. Three of the musicians were stuck in Europe and we had to come up with a brand new festival on the spot. Lucille did most of the organizing, if not all of it, and I really think it all turned out for the better. The audience enjoyed the new programs very much and we had a lot of fun playing "a lot" of music. On the flip side of it, we couldn't spend any time on Aruba's gorgeous white beaches. Only 15 minutes at the beginning of the festival were enough to give me an embarrassing T-shirt tan which will stay with me a for the next few months. So a lot of unexpected work and no holiday, but then, I'd rather be working looking at the beach and looking forward to a freshly made Pina Colada than anything else. I also met a lot of new wonderful musician friends, and had the feeling that very long friendship started this week. That's an incredibly rewarding feeling.
I now have eight full hours at MIA and no excuse not to update my blog. I am on my way to Bilbao, where I will be rehearsing the Tchaikovsky First Concerto with the Bilbao Symphony to play it in Madrid's Auditorio Nacional on the 29th and in Salamanca on the 30th . This is the concert that triggered that strange exclusivity clause with my contract with the Castilla and Leon  Orchestra last month and saw Lucille come to the rescue...
I am very excited to be playing in the main hall of the Auditorio Nacional for the first time. I played in the recital hall for Joaquin Achucarro's 70th birthday a few years back, and this is now quite a nice event for me. The schedule is pretty hectic. Rehearsals on the 27 and 28, bus to Madrid on the 29, concert in Madrid (at 1030pm!!!), bus to Salamanca on the 30, concert in Salamanca, bus to Bilbao and recital in Mondragon on May 1. Then on May 2 I fly (via Stuttgart!!) to Bari for rehearse a chamber concert on the 5th. I will stay few days in my home town to be with family, get a new tuxedo made, and a couple of suits "touched-up". Lucille will reach me on the 4th and we'll go to Lubeck for the last concert of this segment on the 13th. Back to NYC on the 14th and rehearsing a chamber program on the 15th morning!

The Tres Leches cake in the lounge looks very tempting right now. After a night spent with musicians roaming an island in search of food, running into closed restaurants and ending up at a McDonald's,  a Tres Leches sounds very good! Maybe if I dare venture outside the lounge I can find a nice cuban cafecito somewhere in Miami airport.
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Blackberry pictures of a couple of rehearsal breaks in Aruba:

weather trouble

8am. I wake up to a snow covered view of Central Park. Pretty, I think, then look down and see cars and buses either stopped on the circle, or spinning their wheels trying to get out of the snow. I get my Blackberry out of bedside mode, and the phone starts buzzing uncontrollably. 10 emails, 7 facebook alerts and 1 voice mail. Everything is pretty standard, but the voice mail worries me. As it turns out, it is a "courtesy" call by American Airlines saying our flights out of LGA were cancelled because of weather. The friendly voice goes on saying that they kindly re-booked us one day later, through Miami all the way to Madrid. It's all fine with me, but I realize that Lucille will have to play her recital about two hours after touching down. We call AA's Executive Platinum desk, knowing that no matter how high one is on the priority list, it's going to be a long wait. The scene is something to behold: two blackberries, and our home phone, all set on speakerphone, playing AA's holding jingles, sounding like an edgy minimalist trio for three computerized travel agents accompanied by elevator music. The piece lasts for about 30 minutes, at the end of which a very nice travel agent, a real person this time, makes sure we have seats together tomorrow, and wishes us good luck getting a flight. By the looks of it, I dare not make any predictions, but the snow seems to be getting worse. 

It's been a rough winter season. I managed to get on the last flight to Florida two weeks ago, before Dallas was covered by a record-breaking 12 inches of snow. Lucille was stuck there for an extra day and reached me in Florida just in time to hear my first performance ever of Chopin's Second Piano Concerto and to celebrate Valentine's day. Earlier this year, she had to cancel a concert in Washington, DC, also because of weather. Hopefully this time things will work out. After her recital near Madrid, we'll be off for three concerts with the Grieg Concerto and the lovely Castilla y Leon Symphony Orchestra in Valladolid and Salamanca. I am really excited to be back there, to play for the first time in their new hall in Valladolid, and to be working with conductor Vasily Petrenko. Of course, I can't wait to have their world famous suckling lamb once again. About a month ago this tour almost fell apart. The management realized that I was booked to play in the Salamanca hall with two different orchestras on two different tours, one month apart. Because of some exclusivity clause, buried deep inside some contracts, this could not happen. Happily they asked Lucille to play the concert in Salamanca, which makes this tour quite unusual. I'll do the rehearsals and play the concerts in Valladolid, then she'll have a quick sound check on the day of the last concert in Salamanca, and I will be sitting in the hall enjoying her performance of the Grieg! 

All of this, weather permitting!

A bonus post about food...

I know, I know. I meant to stay quiet until the end of 2009, but I just had to post this. It's been a great culinary week. It started with seafood shopping and the amazing Chelsea Market (16th street and 9th avenue) for our Vigilia dinner. I made Lucille's favorite dish...zuppa di pesce (fish soup). We were so impressed with the quality of the seafood at the Chelsea Market. The zuppa di pesce was at the center of our Christmas dinner.
It is made in a few easy steps (see pics below). Prepare a fish stock (any fish bones and heads would do. I was given the remains of a striped bass by the fishmonger). Lightly steam the clams. Sautee garlic, onions and tomato paste. Add squid and octopus. Add Clams. Add tomato sauce (I used canned cherry tomatoes and San Marzano tomato puree). At the very end,  add the red mullets or any other fish and cook for just a few minutes. Season (very little salt, as fish is quite salty, pepper, and I like hot paprika and saffron stems)....add fresh parsley. That's it...pretty simple, eh? The best thing is that you can use almost any kind of fish and seafood.

And to add to the seafood feast, last night we went to an amazing restaurant called Sik Gaek in Flushing, NY. The 1-hour long commute was well worth it. The place specialize in Korean seafood and has become very popular since it was featured on the Anthony Bourdain's No Reservation show about the outer boroughs.  It has a really laid back and cool atmosphere, lots of drinks and most importantly amazing seafood. One of their specialty is a live octopus appetizer. It's cut while still live and it keeps moving and trying to run off the plate for about ten more minutes. It doesn't get much fresher than this... The suction action that the tentacles have while you chew is an experience.  You can see the video of the live octopus here.

The main dish was a seafood stew (this time a spicy Korean one, of course) that was just a feast for the eyes. Giant clams, mussels, octopus, squid, crabs, live lobster (yes, live, but not for long) and even abalone! Simply amazing! It was quite a shock to come out the restaurant and be in Flushing! We had felt as if we were in Korea during the whole meal.

Home till 2010

I will finally be home until the new year. After a year full of travels and wonderful places Lucille and I are planning a quiet holiday sitting on the couch, watching TV, eating, and hanging out with our close friends. It's been a great year, personally and musically speaking and I just feel once again so lucky to be doing what I love to do and hopefully getting every day closer and closer to my music.
My proudest 2009 moment? Racking up nearly 140,000 base miles on American Airlines, and qualifying for ExecPlat for the fourth year in a row...
Musically speaking there have been lots of rewarding moments, among them the release of Bach Transcribed and its reception. But honestly, it would be unfair to pick out single events as I luckily still feel that what I enjoy the most is the process of diving deeper and deeper in the music, day after day.
So, back to the couch for few minutes, with a nice espresso, then alas, my piano is awaiting. Lots of repertoire to learn as it feels a full year of performances is literally just around the corner, with my personal hope to start in January with renewed energy and more enthusiasm than ever.
Happy holidays and remember to eat well and that life is too short for bad wine...

it's about time...here's my journal from the first tour of Russia in 2007

Over two years have passed from my first Trans-siberian tour of Russia in 2007. I went back with Lucille in 2008 and in both occasion I wrote long journals about the experience. I kept them for me and a few friends until now, but I think I'm quite ready to share them. Here is the journal from 2007.  The order of the pictures is completely random....Hope you enjoy it.

Here's the LINK