Yuja Wang

To celebrate the 150th birthday of Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943), Yuja Wang joined the L.A. Philharmonic under the baton of Gustavo Dudamel to perform all four of the composer's piano concertos and his Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini over two consecutive weekends. This ambitious project took place at Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, the city where Rachmaninoff spent the last months of his life.

On Thursday, 20 June 2019, The Vienna Philharmonic performed its annual Summer Night Concert at Schönbrunn, an open air event with free admission in the unique ambience of the gardens of Schönbrunn Palace. Gustavo Dudamel conducts this open-air concert for the second time after 2012, the evening's soloist is the Beijing-born pianist Yuja Wang.
The focus of the Summer Night Concert 2019 is the music history of the United States of America. The works that were performed this year were written in or for America.

Yuja Wang is one of the most technically astounding pianists of our time, with a command of the keyboard matched by sheer muscular strength. Here she turns her attention to Russia and some of its leading pianist-composers. The Rachmaninoff Preludes and Études-Tableaux are rich and swirl with passion, while Scriabin’s Tenth Sonata, a work of mystical imaginings, seethes with dangerous life under her fingers. Briefly looking further afield, a group of Hungarian composer György Ligeti’s tiny Études diverts the attention magically before Prokofiev’s Eighth Piano Sonata, his masterpiece in the form, which Wang characterizes with genuine originality and imagination.

Pianist Yuja Wang and composer/conductor Teddy Abrams were classmates at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia and had long wanted to work together. The sympathy shows in this 2023 Deutsche Grammophon release, which perhaps turned out even better than the performers had hoped. Abrams' 11-movement Piano Concerto is a standout among the jazz-flavored works that crowd American concert programs (and increasingly those beyond) every year. The work is neither simply swing jazz transferred to an orchestral medium nor a classical piece that uses jazz as a flavoring.

"Finesse and fire from a starry musical duo… A recital that showcased the very best in collaborative music-making," was how the Toronto Star described the concert at Koerner Hall in Toronto that formed the basis for this recording. The program for the album comprises two works by Chopin, his Sonata in A Major and his Polonaise brillante in C Major, and Franck's Sonata in A Major, a transcription by the 19th century cellist Jules Delsart of the Belgian composer's glorious violin sonata.

Pianist Yuja Wang, clarinettist Andreas Ottensamer and cellist Gautier Capu‡on have earned a reputation as a "super-trio", having given performances worldwide that reveal the instinctive, almost telepathic bond of musical communication that exists between the three players. Works by Sergei Rachmaninoff & Johannes Brahms includes visionary interpretations of Rachmaninoff's Cello Sonata Op. 19, Brahms's Cello Sonata No.1 Op. 38 and the same composer's Trio for piano, clarinet and cello Op. 14.