EPHEMORY / CHUREN LI Piano Recital / Review

EPHEMORY

CHUREN LI Piano Recital

Yale-NUS Performance Hall

Tuesday (31 May 2022)

 

The sad thing about music and musicians is how often we dichotomise the genre as classical or non-classical / pop / jazz / folk / crossover and other pigeon-holes. These have little to do with music but rather to satisfy limited world-views of the narrow-minded. Why shouldn’t a classical musician be allowed to play jazz, or why can’t a jazz musician be taken seriously in classical music? All this does not make real sense, until one encounters the geniuses that are Keith Jarrett, Chick Corea and Friedrich Gulda. They are simply unboxable musical personalities. In the local context, I will give a shout out for Churen Li, who is the closest thing I know to be the “complete pianist”.

 

Having heard her perform classical repertoire, concertos (Beethoven and Rachmaninov), chamber music, contemporary music (George Crumb, Panufnik, Piazzolla), film music, pop music, improvisations and her own original compositions, there is nothing she does that is not totally convincing. In short, all-round excellence is her game. Her farewell recital, concluding two years of teaching at the Yale-NUS College of liberal arts, also coincided with the launch of her debut CD recording Ephemory. The hour-long recital was a summation and culmination of her art, where classical music, composition and improvisation came together in a heady and spectacular whole.

 

The art of preluding, which is improvising before a piece of music actually begins, was thought to be lost for many decades. Churen has revived it in a most persuasive manner possible, by joining seemingly unrelated pieces or sequences together such that they made complete sense. Some of her works, usually titled Prelude after (name any Composer), give an idea how this comes to fruition. A well-known theme is introduced and then improvised, usually with interesting harmonisations, before going off on a tangent. Sometimes an unrelated theme is first heard, and then the music gradually segues into familiar territory. This is how jazz people operate, usually with the utmost freedom which classical people seem to shy away from. In Churen’s case, she is simply fearless.

 

Also simply peerless, one might add. The evening began with the brief Prelude after Bach, based on the Prelude from JSB’s Cello Suite No.2 in D minor (BWV.1008). This served as the prelude to Churen’s own Llama’s Land, which begins with simple waltz rhythm and then takes on flights of fancy. In Prelude after Chopin, the E minor Prelude (Op.28 No.4) is improvised upon, then linked to the Fantaisie-Impromptu (Op.66), thus completing a metamorphosis from melancholy to sheer brilliance. Another interesting tandem joined the first movement of Ravel’s Sonatine with her own Butterfly, which inverts the Ravel theme, supposedly also found in Walton’s First Symphony (I have yet to figure out that last bit.)

 

Churen’s take on Bill Evans’ version of Alice in Wonderland precedes Andante Cantabile, itself based on the cello melody from the slow movement of Schumann’s Piano Quartet (Op.47). Its sheer beauty is vividly captured, and then Alice returns, as if now peering through a looking glass, but Schumann has the last word with transfigured harmonies. In Fantasy after Mozart, the subject is the slow movement Sicilienne from Mozart’s Piano Concerto No.23 (K.488). It is first heard in G minor, then undergoes several transpositions, also managing to incorporate the earlier Chopin Prelude (Op.28 No.4) before homing on the “rightful” key of F sharp minor.

 

The recital closed with a stunning Percy Grainger-Churen Li transcription of the first movement of Grieg’s Piano Concerto, served up with an irrepressible gusto that only she knew how. This is unapologetically big-boned playing, scarcely credible given her little frame, but seeing and hearing is believing. Her version even tops the Grainger by including Grieg’s Lisztian cadenza and all its frills (massive chords and octave rolls) before closing in extreme bravura. Her forthcoming Grieg concerto date with the Singapore Symphony in July must simply not be missed!

 

Finally, a little encore recalling the harmonies of Keith Jarrett, ever wistful and yearning, left one clamouring for more.