Who were your principal teachers?

The teachers to whom I attribute most of my musicianship today are Alan Chow, who I studied with prior to college, Robert McDonald at both the Curtis Institute of Music and Juilliard School, and Yoheved Kaplinsky at the Juilliard School. Out of the three, I studied with Mr McDonald the longest – for about nine years.

Beyond your teachers, who have been the biggest musical influences on you?

I can think of so many, especially when it comes to pianists whose playing I have long admired and found great inspiration in. Grigory Sokolov, Arcadi Volodos, Murray Perahia, Radu Lupu, Mitsuko Uchida and Dang Thai Son are a few who have been tremendously important in my musical life.

If you could take just one recording to a desert island, what would it be?

If I could, it would be the box-set of JS Bach’s Cantatas recorded by Karl Richter and the Münchener Bach-Chor. It is extraordinarily beautiful music and playing, and has brought incredible nourishment and peace to my soul over the years.

What was your most recent musical discovery?

Shostakovich’s Symphony No 11! It was recommended to me by a friend who had by chance heard it live in concert. I had never heard anything so epic in my life, and I felt that just from a recording – I can only imagine what it would be like to experience live in a concert hall.

What was the last thing you were practicing?

Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No 5. I am just bringing it back to perform next month.

Which solo piece would you most love to learn but haven’t yet got around to playing?

I have not played much Schubert in my life, but he is one of the composers that I have long loved and felt close to for most of my years. Perhaps the piece I constantly dream of playing is his Sonata in G major, D894.

Which piano concertos should be heard in concert more often?

In comparison to the rest of his concertos, I feel Rachmaninov’s First Concerto should be heard in concert more. Very often I see his Second or Third Concertos, or the Paganini Variations, being performed, and I think the First is a tremendous piece that embodies a different kind of emotional power.

Which composers are the most underrated or wrongly neglected?

It may be a bit unexpected, but the first composer that comes to mind is Mendelssohn. Perhaps he is not totally neglected, but he is often considered not on the same level as Beethoven, Mozart or Brahms. Yet some of his works, such as the Songs without Words, have such poetry in them and I believe they deserve much more credit than they are given.

What are the major works you’re playing over the coming months?

A few of the major works I will be playing are Chopin’s Second Piano Sonata, Brahms’s Op 10 Ballades, Franck’s Prelude, Chorale et Fugue and Scriabin’s Piano Sonata No 3. These are all part of recital programmes that I’m playing over the summer.

Do you have a personal favourite of your own recordings?

My recent Beethoven and Brahms recording on Orchid Classiscs was something I came to be quite proud of, because of the amount of thought, effort and time dedicated not only by myself but by all the people who helped create the final product. I could not be more grateful for the masterly craft of each individual person who worked on it, as well as the overall conditions that I could record in.

Do you have any concert memories that especially stand out?

A memory that comes to mind is from a recital I played last year. I had started the concert with Beethoven’s Pathétique Sonata, Op 13, with its thunderous first chord and intensely dramatic beginning; and as I was playing through the introduction, a thunderstorm began to erupt outside. So much heavy rain was slapping down on the windows, with raucous thunder roaring in the background, that it felt almost as if Beethoven himself had descended upon the area!

This feature originally appeared in the SUMMER 2025 issue of International Piano – Subscribe Today

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