WEBVTT 00:00:04.250 --> 00:00:06.870 Music is the universal language. Well, if it's 00:00:06.870 --> 00:00:09.189 a universal language, we have a syntax problem 00:00:09.189 --> 00:00:11.509 because most of the people just don't understand 00:00:11.509 --> 00:00:16.750 what we do. I would say our mission as a duo 00:00:16.750 --> 00:00:19.350 is to bridge worlds and to make the world we 00:00:19.350 --> 00:00:39.240 connect to more beautiful. We come from very 00:00:39.240 --> 00:00:43.600 different cultures. And the fact that we come 00:00:43.600 --> 00:00:46.939 together as a four -hand piano duo sharing one 00:00:46.939 --> 00:00:50.619 piano, and we have to make things work, and making 00:00:50.619 --> 00:00:53.880 music to share with people, I think sends out 00:00:53.880 --> 00:00:57.560 the message that music truly connects people, 00:00:57.759 --> 00:01:01.020 regardless of their background or cultures. I 00:01:01.020 --> 00:01:03.640 think the piano in particular is one of those 00:01:03.640 --> 00:01:06.480 unique instruments that has truly... been able 00:01:06.480 --> 00:01:10.659 to bridge so many cultural barriers. This remarkable 00:01:10.659 --> 00:01:15.000 machine, 300 years of development, pieces of 00:01:15.000 --> 00:01:18.939 physics and art and engineering has come to be 00:01:18.939 --> 00:01:23.079 so beloved by so many different cultures and 00:01:23.079 --> 00:01:26.140 peoples around the world and that it's truly 00:01:26.140 --> 00:01:29.439 a piece of art that helps us to find a common 00:01:29.439 --> 00:01:34.409 voice. Hello, friends, and welcome back to Season 00:01:34.409 --> 00:01:37.769 6 of The Piano Pod, our season of creativity 00:01:37.769 --> 00:01:41.629 and connection. I am so excited for today's episode 00:01:41.629 --> 00:01:44.829 because our guests really bring those two ideas 00:01:44.829 --> 00:01:49.790 to life. You may know them as Mada and Hugh Piano 00:01:49.790 --> 00:01:53.469 Duo, Romanian -born pianist Madalina Danila and 00:01:53.469 --> 00:01:56.890 Korean -American pianist Hugh Sung. But let me 00:01:56.890 --> 00:01:59.950 tell you, they are so much more than a four -hand 00:01:59.950 --> 00:02:03.030 ensemble. Their performances are electrifying, 00:02:03.189 --> 00:02:06.150 their arrangements imaginative, and their videos 00:02:06.150 --> 00:02:09.210 pull you right into a world where tradition and 00:02:09.210 --> 00:02:13.090 innovation meet. What makes this conversation 00:02:13.090 --> 00:02:17.550 especially meaningful is their story. These are 00:02:17.550 --> 00:02:21.349 two artists from very different backgrounds who 00:02:21.349 --> 00:02:26.030 dared to take risks, reinvent themselves, and 00:02:26.030 --> 00:02:31.969 build something entirely new together. From Madalina's 00:02:31.969 --> 00:02:35.270 deep dive into George Crumb and her Romanian 00:02:35.270 --> 00:02:39.689 roots, to Hugh's pioneering work in music technology 00:02:39.689 --> 00:02:42.789 like co -creating Airturn and entrepreneurship, 00:02:43.210 --> 00:02:47.469 they have created not just a duo, but a shared 00:02:47.469 --> 00:02:51.030 artistic vision built on resilience, creativity, 00:02:51.210 --> 00:02:54.849 and love, with their dog Zeus often by their 00:02:54.849 --> 00:02:59.169 side. In our conversation, you will hear about 00:02:59.169 --> 00:03:02.539 their artistry, their bold arrangements, the 00:03:02.539 --> 00:03:06.099 unique challenges and joys of four -hand piano 00:03:06.099 --> 00:03:10.000 playing, their entrepreneurial spirit, and what 00:03:10.000 --> 00:03:12.979 it really means to bridge cultures through music. 00:03:14.680 --> 00:03:18.080 Before we begin, I want to pause and thank you 00:03:18.080 --> 00:03:21.139 for being here. Every time you hit the thumbs 00:03:21.139 --> 00:03:24.919 up, leave a rating, subscribe on your favorite 00:03:24.919 --> 00:03:27.780 podcast platform, or share an episode with a 00:03:27.780 --> 00:03:31.439 friend, It helps this work continue. It truly 00:03:31.439 --> 00:03:34.580 means the world to me, and I am so grateful for 00:03:34.580 --> 00:03:37.939 your support. And I also want to remind you about 00:03:37.939 --> 00:03:41.300 something special. The Pianopod Live in Concert 00:03:41.300 --> 00:03:44.020 at the Stiefel Hall, presented in partnership 00:03:44.020 --> 00:03:47.939 with Mattis Prep at The New School, a pre -college 00:03:47.939 --> 00:03:50.960 music program offering comprehensive and nurturing 00:03:50.960 --> 00:03:54.800 pre -professional training. Please join us on 00:03:54.800 --> 00:03:58.360 October 4th. for an unforgettable evening of 00:03:58.360 --> 00:04:02.780 music, conversation, and community. So with that, 00:04:02.780 --> 00:04:06.259 here is Season 6, Episode 2 of The Piano Pod 00:04:06.259 --> 00:04:10.759 with the award -winning Mada and Hugh Piano Duo. 00:04:11.180 --> 00:04:19.490 Please enjoy the show. You are listening to The 00:04:19.490 --> 00:04:21.910 Piano Pod, where we talk to the brightest minds 00:04:21.910 --> 00:04:24.389 in the industry about how they are bringing the 00:04:24.389 --> 00:04:27.329 piano into the future and thriving in a complex, 00:04:27.629 --> 00:04:35.129 ever -evolving world. Maralina and Hugh, welcome 00:04:35.129 --> 00:04:38.069 to The Piano Pod. Thank you for being here today, 00:04:38.189 --> 00:04:42.949 and you are a truly captivating duo, and I'm 00:04:42.949 --> 00:04:45.569 so excited that you're here, not only for your 00:04:45.569 --> 00:04:48.079 artistry, but for the way you've... build your 00:04:48.079 --> 00:04:51.939 brand and life together and performances that 00:04:51.939 --> 00:04:55.740 bridge cultures and generations and the repertoire 00:04:55.740 --> 00:04:58.720 spanning classical masterpieces to your own well 00:04:58.720 --> 00:05:02.339 crafted arrangements of, you know, pop tunes 00:05:02.339 --> 00:05:06.300 and so on. And your videos and podcast, you know, 00:05:06.300 --> 00:05:11.000 we are fellow podcasters here and are super educational 00:05:11.000 --> 00:05:15.459 that really invite audiences with clarity. warmth 00:05:15.459 --> 00:05:18.100 and joy. I'm so looking forward to exploring 00:05:18.100 --> 00:05:20.959 your individual projects as well today and then 00:05:20.959 --> 00:05:26.300 entrepreneurship also. So as we begin, I'd like 00:05:26.300 --> 00:05:29.779 to start with this question. If you were to describe 00:05:29.779 --> 00:05:33.480 your mission or passion in a few words or in 00:05:33.480 --> 00:05:36.459 a sentence or two, how would you describe it? 00:05:36.800 --> 00:05:40.300 So for me is making music, living an artistic 00:05:40.300 --> 00:05:44.829 life and sharing my talents and my gifts. and 00:05:44.829 --> 00:05:48.009 what I believe in with people and making this 00:05:48.009 --> 00:05:52.029 place better as much as I can. Beautiful. Yeah, 00:05:52.069 --> 00:05:55.470 I think it's a wonderful statement. For me, I 00:05:55.470 --> 00:05:57.269 come from a place where I'm very conscious of 00:05:57.269 --> 00:06:02.709 the fact that what we do as pianists, as musicians, 00:06:02.750 --> 00:06:06.529 is very, how should we say, very disconnected 00:06:06.529 --> 00:06:10.870 with the modern world in some ways. And I remember 00:06:10.870 --> 00:06:14.189 very much as a child growing up, not understanding 00:06:14.189 --> 00:06:18.029 the musical language at all and um struggling 00:06:18.029 --> 00:06:21.670 with you know being forced into this world of 00:06:21.670 --> 00:06:24.550 playing and and playing all these wonderful masterpieces 00:06:24.550 --> 00:06:28.670 but having no idea what anything meant so for 00:06:28.670 --> 00:06:32.269 me my passion my personal passion has been to 00:06:32.269 --> 00:06:36.889 connect with audiences and really Help them to 00:06:36.889 --> 00:06:40.250 feel welcome, to learn about what we do, to share 00:06:40.250 --> 00:06:43.829 how beautiful music can be, and to understand 00:06:43.829 --> 00:06:47.329 that there can be a lot to absorb and to try 00:06:47.329 --> 00:06:51.790 to make what we do as presentable in a way so 00:06:51.790 --> 00:06:56.069 that our art is as welcoming as possible to as 00:06:56.069 --> 00:06:58.569 many people as possible, not just art for its 00:06:58.569 --> 00:07:01.850 own sake. Well said. Thank you. And would you 00:07:01.850 --> 00:07:06.259 like to say as the mission as to? as a duo i 00:07:06.259 --> 00:07:09.459 would say our mission as a duo is to bridge worlds 00:07:09.459 --> 00:07:12.120 and to make the world we connect to more beautiful 00:07:12.120 --> 00:07:15.420 yeah first of all we we come from very different 00:07:15.420 --> 00:07:19.139 cultures extremely different cultures and backgrounds 00:07:19.139 --> 00:07:23.000 they cannot emphasize different enough and the 00:07:23.000 --> 00:07:26.860 fact that we come together as a four -hand piano 00:07:26.860 --> 00:07:29.879 duo sharing one piano so it's not even you know 00:07:29.879 --> 00:07:33.480 two instruments so two pianos but one piano and 00:07:33.480 --> 00:07:37.660 we have to make things work we have to collaborate 00:07:37.660 --> 00:07:43.279 at all possible levels and making music to share 00:07:43.279 --> 00:07:46.639 with people i think sends out the message that 00:07:46.639 --> 00:07:50.920 music truly connects people regardless of their 00:07:50.920 --> 00:07:54.579 background or cultures or ways of thinking or 00:07:54.579 --> 00:07:59.430 political ideas you know etc and Yeah, I think 00:07:59.430 --> 00:08:03.149 our goal becomes their goal. So it becomes a 00:08:03.149 --> 00:08:06.810 unified. I think the piano in particular is one 00:08:06.810 --> 00:08:09.769 of those unique instruments that has truly been 00:08:09.769 --> 00:08:13.949 able to bridge so many cultural barriers. This 00:08:13.949 --> 00:08:17.509 remarkable machine, 300 years of development 00:08:17.509 --> 00:08:21.329 from Cristofori's first pianofortes to what we 00:08:21.329 --> 00:08:26.069 have today. it's just amazing to see how this 00:08:26.069 --> 00:08:29.730 this complex one of the most complex pieces of 00:08:29.730 --> 00:08:33.629 physics and art and engineering has come to be 00:08:33.629 --> 00:08:37.789 so beloved by so many different cultures and 00:08:37.789 --> 00:08:40.929 peoples around the world and that it's it's truly 00:08:40.929 --> 00:08:44.710 a machine from intents and purposes a piece of 00:08:44.710 --> 00:08:48.110 art that helps us to find a common voice so i 00:08:48.110 --> 00:08:50.649 would say if we were to make it a marketing speak 00:08:50.649 --> 00:08:56.919 maybe four hands one piano One world in one piano 00:08:56.919 --> 00:09:00.279 or something like that. Four hands, two hearts, 00:09:00.500 --> 00:09:04.639 and one world. Yeah, exactly. That's beautiful. 00:09:05.179 --> 00:09:08.320 That's beautiful. Now, the hardest question of 00:09:08.320 --> 00:09:13.480 the day is over. So well done. Yes. We really 00:09:13.480 --> 00:09:15.399 need to spend some time. That's a great, great 00:09:15.399 --> 00:09:17.840 mission statement question that I think we still 00:09:17.840 --> 00:09:20.399 need to work through. But thank you for getting 00:09:20.399 --> 00:09:21.080 us to at least think about it. That's a great 00:09:21.080 --> 00:09:23.509 question to think about. Exactly. No, thank you. 00:09:23.549 --> 00:09:26.830 But, you know, it's nice to have intentions to 00:09:26.830 --> 00:09:30.509 anything we do. And actually, you both are actually 00:09:30.509 --> 00:09:33.870 doing it. So that's why I thought this question 00:09:33.870 --> 00:09:36.309 to start out with would be really appropriate 00:09:36.309 --> 00:09:39.889 today. But I can't help but notice this little 00:09:39.889 --> 00:09:46.309 baby here. Can you introduce us? For those who 00:09:46.309 --> 00:09:48.990 are listening, we have this little puppy on the 00:09:48.990 --> 00:09:52.769 screen that Madalina is holding. So can you introduce 00:09:52.769 --> 00:09:57.230 us? So this is Zeus. He is a 10 -month -old cotton 00:09:57.230 --> 00:10:01.549 detulier. I know that for many people, this breed 00:10:01.549 --> 00:10:05.129 can be pretty unknown. And it was unknown to 00:10:05.129 --> 00:10:10.830 us before we found out about it. Well, yeah, 00:10:10.950 --> 00:10:15.470 I think he is the glue between us. So I would... 00:10:15.470 --> 00:10:18.029 One of the many glues. One of the many glues, 00:10:18.090 --> 00:10:21.789 yes. And I would say that he's also a very important 00:10:21.789 --> 00:10:26.610 part backstage in terms of our duo and in terms 00:10:26.610 --> 00:10:33.509 of our communication skills. And I would... I'd 00:10:33.509 --> 00:10:35.830 like to add that, you know, as an individual, 00:10:35.970 --> 00:10:38.950 that one of my life's goals is to have as many 00:10:38.950 --> 00:10:43.250 puppies as possible. I love puppies. Enjoy life. 00:10:43.389 --> 00:10:47.190 He was like, no, no, no. But we do have Zeus 00:10:47.190 --> 00:10:50.769 on stage with us as often as possible. You know, 00:10:50.809 --> 00:10:53.580 it's interesting, as young as he is. And this 00:10:53.580 --> 00:10:57.000 particular breed is very friendly and very sweet. 00:10:57.320 --> 00:10:59.960 Just got the most wonderful disposition. And 00:10:59.960 --> 00:11:03.000 folks are just amazed that he will sit on stage 00:11:03.000 --> 00:11:05.840 with us just quietly. He enjoys the music. We 00:11:05.840 --> 00:11:09.860 take bows together with him, travels on the plane 00:11:09.860 --> 00:11:12.340 with us. He's been a wonderful travel companion, 00:11:12.539 --> 00:11:16.720 stage companion. He loves it and he loves people, 00:11:16.840 --> 00:11:21.570 you know, and just the most remarkable. remarkable 00:11:21.570 --> 00:11:24.730 dog that we've I've ever met yeah so to have 00:11:24.730 --> 00:11:28.289 him in our life and he has a such a I don't know 00:11:28.289 --> 00:11:33.029 such a good look you know he may say so I think 00:11:33.029 --> 00:11:35.169 so too he's just got this he doesn't look real 00:11:35.169 --> 00:11:36.990 he's like yeah he doesn't look he looks like 00:11:36.990 --> 00:11:40.149 a doll yeah he's on batteries or something yeah 00:11:40.149 --> 00:11:46.649 that's true well welcome Zeus so now I want to 00:11:46.649 --> 00:11:50.759 continue our conversation from you choose as 00:11:50.759 --> 00:11:53.639 a duo together. So, you know, forehand duo playing 00:11:53.639 --> 00:11:56.159 is such a fascinating genre, you know, rooted 00:11:56.159 --> 00:11:59.519 in tradition. However, it's so innovative and 00:11:59.519 --> 00:12:02.720 creative at the same time, right? In your case, 00:12:02.779 --> 00:12:05.559 I've been taking the artistry really further, 00:12:05.700 --> 00:12:09.600 adding visual elements and choreography with 00:12:09.600 --> 00:12:12.259 cross the hands, you know, and then even percussion 00:12:12.259 --> 00:12:17.929 effects like catatorians, saber dance. Oh, so 00:12:17.929 --> 00:12:22.429 tell us about this four -hand duet thing, the 00:12:22.429 --> 00:12:25.250 artistry of four -hand duet. Why you were so 00:12:25.250 --> 00:12:27.529 attracted to do it? Well, you know, obviously 00:12:27.529 --> 00:12:31.549 it's more practical than two pianos. Two pianos, 00:12:31.549 --> 00:12:34.200 of course. Yeah, tell us. Well, I mean, I think 00:12:34.200 --> 00:12:36.899 there will be opportunities for us to, and we're 00:12:36.899 --> 00:12:39.919 actually looking into doing a two -piano program 00:12:39.919 --> 00:12:41.960 later on. Again, whenever the opportunity is 00:12:41.960 --> 00:12:45.279 there, we can certainly fill that in. But pragmatically, 00:12:45.340 --> 00:12:48.059 for most of the concerts that we are booking, 00:12:48.320 --> 00:12:52.509 one piano is just easier. to get concerts for, 00:12:52.610 --> 00:12:54.809 just pragmatically speaking. I think he wants 00:12:54.809 --> 00:12:58.370 you. Oh, okay. It's my turn. So certainly Anderson 00:12:58.370 --> 00:13:01.590 and Rowe have been very influential in terms 00:13:01.590 --> 00:13:05.409 of their physicality. And I think I just admire 00:13:05.409 --> 00:13:08.830 so much how they brought a lot of innovative 00:13:08.830 --> 00:13:15.740 ways to blend forehand technique. on just another 00:13:15.740 --> 00:13:18.820 level that I had never seen before. And it's 00:13:18.820 --> 00:13:21.620 interesting, we're in the process of doing a 00:13:21.620 --> 00:13:24.840 retrospective on the history of forehand piano 00:13:24.840 --> 00:13:27.279 playing music, you know, and it seems to have, 00:13:27.399 --> 00:13:29.879 there were some earlier works, but Mozart and 00:13:29.879 --> 00:13:32.720 his sister Nannerl were really the first to, 00:13:32.820 --> 00:13:35.019 you know, they wrote for themselves. They were 00:13:35.019 --> 00:13:38.259 the first to be the sensationalized duo as children. 00:13:41.279 --> 00:13:45.179 For so much of that time, there were zones, polite 00:13:45.179 --> 00:13:49.080 zones. The male secondo, the lower voice on the 00:13:49.080 --> 00:13:52.320 left hand, would be in his zone, and the female 00:13:52.320 --> 00:13:55.460 primo would be on the upper part of the piano. 00:13:55.500 --> 00:13:57.779 They would stay in their places for the most 00:13:57.779 --> 00:14:00.360 part, and then not until we get into more of 00:14:00.360 --> 00:14:02.789 the romantic era that we start to see. Noddy 00:14:02.789 --> 00:14:05.970 hand crossings. So, you know, just to summarize 00:14:05.970 --> 00:14:09.330 what Hugh described, basically the development 00:14:09.330 --> 00:14:12.409 of the four -hand piano duo had to do a lot with 00:14:12.409 --> 00:14:16.269 the social environment and cultural environment 00:14:16.269 --> 00:14:20.259 and the changes that... a lot of big changes 00:14:20.259 --> 00:14:23.759 that came after the classicism, right, when Mozart 00:14:23.759 --> 00:14:27.340 was at its peak. And then, like you said, when 00:14:27.340 --> 00:14:31.679 he was a child, he would play a lot of four -hand 00:14:31.679 --> 00:14:36.259 duos with his sister, who apparently, and I read 00:14:36.259 --> 00:14:38.659 something about it just the other day, was just 00:14:38.659 --> 00:14:44.039 as talented as he was. Mozart in many of his 00:14:44.039 --> 00:14:47.240 letters to his father praised her a lot for her 00:14:47.240 --> 00:14:51.539 abilities as a pianist, as a composer. Yeah, 00:14:51.600 --> 00:14:55.320 unfortunately, their duo didn't continue. But 00:14:55.320 --> 00:14:57.019 it also had to do with, I think, the physical 00:14:57.019 --> 00:14:59.279 development of the piano. Back in Bach's time, 00:14:59.500 --> 00:15:02.259 the piano was simply not wide enough. It wouldn't 00:15:02.259 --> 00:15:04.500 be practical for two people. Not to mention that 00:15:04.500 --> 00:15:07.259 women had all those garments, which is impossible 00:15:07.259 --> 00:15:12.299 to sit closely. So there were physical barriers 00:15:12.299 --> 00:15:15.419 to having... forehand duets i mean certainly 00:15:15.419 --> 00:15:18.600 there were multi -keyboard ensembles of two pianos 00:15:18.600 --> 00:15:21.179 there's the three three even four four harpsichords 00:15:21.179 --> 00:15:24.220 right yeah but you know in box time but in terms 00:15:24.220 --> 00:15:25.759 of two people playing on one instrument it was 00:15:25.759 --> 00:15:28.580 really due to just the physical limitations of 00:15:28.580 --> 00:15:31.879 having you know 60 some keys as opposed to the 00:15:31.879 --> 00:15:34.980 88 we have now you know and as the piano developed 00:15:34.980 --> 00:15:39.549 then the forehand developed really as a great 00:15:39.549 --> 00:15:43.570 marketing tool for Brahms, who recognized the 00:15:43.570 --> 00:15:45.909 power of it, to have people in their homes to 00:15:45.909 --> 00:15:48.490 preview his symphonies or to preview larger works. 00:15:48.730 --> 00:15:51.529 Even Liszt, you know, arranged for four hands. 00:15:51.529 --> 00:15:53.590 Also, you know, Beethoven's symphonies made a 00:15:53.590 --> 00:15:56.110 lot of arrangements. And then, you know, Grieg. 00:15:57.000 --> 00:16:00.320 as a great way of getting the word out of such 00:16:00.320 --> 00:16:02.240 and such an opera, such and such a symphony. 00:16:02.360 --> 00:16:04.860 People could try it out at home and then they 00:16:04.860 --> 00:16:07.480 could experience the orchestra version. So the 00:16:07.480 --> 00:16:10.440 forehand. repertoire uh was a great marketing 00:16:10.440 --> 00:16:12.259 technique and of course then list people like 00:16:12.259 --> 00:16:14.940 yeah and also you know if you think about it 00:16:14.940 --> 00:16:19.399 four hands playing so two people four hands um 00:16:19.399 --> 00:16:22.539 all of a sudden becomes more achievable right 00:16:22.539 --> 00:16:26.039 to to transcribe to arrange uh an opera or a 00:16:26.039 --> 00:16:28.440 symphony for keyboard rather than two hands right 00:16:28.440 --> 00:16:32.019 it's just right it's uh logistics here right 00:16:32.019 --> 00:16:35.000 so everything you can fit everything um more 00:16:35.000 --> 00:16:38.620 easily into four hands rather than in two So, 00:16:38.659 --> 00:16:42.779 yeah, people started to prefer that. Maybe you 00:16:42.779 --> 00:16:45.379 already have answered, but what is it about four 00:16:45.379 --> 00:16:48.960 -hand piano versus two pianos or solo that makes 00:16:48.960 --> 00:16:52.899 it so powerful and special to you? Well, I mean, 00:16:52.980 --> 00:16:56.820 I think for each category, there's special requirements. 00:16:57.440 --> 00:17:01.220 There are limits, of course. So, you know, pros 00:17:01.220 --> 00:17:05.119 and cons. I think when it comes to four hands. 00:17:07.109 --> 00:17:10.630 to one instrument, I think four hands can easily 00:17:10.630 --> 00:17:14.329 bring out the potential of the instrument. So 00:17:14.329 --> 00:17:17.329 it becomes much more powerful than in the situation 00:17:17.329 --> 00:17:21.970 of just one person playing. And then for two 00:17:21.970 --> 00:17:25.160 pianos, a Rachmaninoff. started to fancy the 00:17:25.160 --> 00:17:29.380 two piano formula, right? And also, you know, 00:17:29.380 --> 00:17:31.000 you have to think about that concert venues started 00:17:31.000 --> 00:17:33.980 to become bigger and bigger. So all of a sudden, 00:17:34.019 --> 00:17:36.599 like two pianos made more sense, right, to have 00:17:36.599 --> 00:17:40.680 on stage. And sonically, it was a completely 00:17:40.680 --> 00:17:42.960 different level than just having one piano, so 00:17:42.960 --> 00:17:47.359 four hands. I think for me personally, even though 00:17:47.359 --> 00:17:51.740 I was trained as a soloist at Curtis, I always 00:17:51.740 --> 00:17:54.759 had more fun playing with friends. All my friends 00:17:54.759 --> 00:17:56.880 would say, hey, can you help me with this lesson, 00:17:56.900 --> 00:18:02.619 that? I loved it. I was more comfortable being 00:18:02.619 --> 00:18:08.420 with other musicians. Maybe it was an insecurity, 00:18:08.660 --> 00:18:11.539 who knows, but I never felt comfortable just 00:18:11.539 --> 00:18:15.140 promoting myself. So I always felt like I would 00:18:15.140 --> 00:18:19.160 rather be part of a team. And I've always enjoyed 00:18:19.160 --> 00:18:22.220 that aspect of teamwork where if I could be around 00:18:22.220 --> 00:18:25.720 people that would inspire me, people that were 00:18:25.720 --> 00:18:27.539 different from me, that could challenge me, I 00:18:27.539 --> 00:18:29.839 felt like I could become a better person rather 00:18:29.839 --> 00:18:33.740 than living a soloist's life, which can be very, 00:18:33.819 --> 00:18:37.680 very lonely and very. very challenging. Be careful 00:18:37.680 --> 00:18:39.220 what you wish for in terms of, you know, people 00:18:39.220 --> 00:18:46.880 to challenge you. But that's, I think for me, 00:18:46.900 --> 00:18:51.500 it has been just the, the, what the ability to 00:18:51.500 --> 00:18:55.880 bounce ideas off of her, of somebody else. And 00:18:55.880 --> 00:19:00.519 to, I love that extra added creativity of somebody 00:19:00.519 --> 00:19:03.170 else. working together so for me it's just that 00:19:03.170 --> 00:19:08.150 that unique variety of teamwork and um and it's 00:19:08.150 --> 00:19:10.690 just the forehand rep press so interesting yeah 00:19:10.690 --> 00:19:13.509 so i think uh the core of it it's the idea of 00:19:13.509 --> 00:19:15.650 chamber music right collaborating with people 00:19:15.650 --> 00:19:19.829 forming uh micro this micro society right micro 00:19:19.829 --> 00:19:22.369 family right either two or three it only comes 00:19:22.369 --> 00:19:27.500 to trios or quartets um And as opposed to solo, 00:19:27.700 --> 00:19:30.200 right? This is very different. That's why I said 00:19:30.200 --> 00:19:32.519 before that there are different rules for each 00:19:32.519 --> 00:19:36.779 category. Of course, what I've learned from playing 00:19:36.779 --> 00:19:39.200 chamber music is very, very much transferable 00:19:39.200 --> 00:19:42.759 to solo playing. It helps a lot, at least, you 00:19:42.759 --> 00:19:44.519 know, I'm speaking from personal experience. 00:19:44.700 --> 00:19:46.920 It helps a lot in terms like how I hear music, 00:19:47.079 --> 00:19:50.480 how I approach music, how can I make my two hands 00:19:50.480 --> 00:19:54.579 sound not like two hands, but more, not like. 00:19:54.920 --> 00:19:58.119 this percussion instrument but like completely 00:19:58.119 --> 00:20:01.259 like a um a human voice or an elbow or a clarinet 00:20:01.259 --> 00:20:05.339 um so you know maybe one hand is playing a noble 00:20:05.339 --> 00:20:10.000 line yeah or and and the the other one is playing 00:20:10.000 --> 00:20:13.529 um a bass, for example, like if you think of 00:20:13.529 --> 00:20:17.150 different textures and the way to orchestrate, 00:20:17.250 --> 00:20:20.349 right? Learning from a string quartet is very 00:20:20.349 --> 00:20:22.849 helpful for pianists, for example. So that's 00:20:22.849 --> 00:20:25.269 why I'm saying like chamber music can be so, 00:20:25.390 --> 00:20:28.670 so influential on solo playing and indeed is 00:20:28.670 --> 00:20:33.230 more fun to play with people as difficult and 00:20:33.230 --> 00:20:35.769 challenging it can be as it can be sometimes, 00:20:35.950 --> 00:20:40.839 right? On stage, it is that... back and forth 00:20:40.839 --> 00:20:44.019 game. It's like a tennis game, right? It doesn't 00:20:44.019 --> 00:20:46.039 make sense to play tennis by yourself. You can 00:20:46.039 --> 00:20:48.339 play, actually. I learned tennis with the wall, 00:20:48.420 --> 00:20:53.559 just bouncing the ball against the wall. But 00:20:53.559 --> 00:20:56.519 then, you know, it's no fun. It's very limited. 00:20:56.700 --> 00:21:01.920 But I see this successful duo as siblings. you 00:21:01.920 --> 00:21:06.039 know, twins. Yeah. Yeah. And a married couple. 00:21:06.539 --> 00:21:09.640 Yeah. So it's, it's really fascinating, but that's 00:21:09.640 --> 00:21:14.400 how much also it takes time to put, put the craft, 00:21:14.519 --> 00:21:18.960 you know, craft that our artistry. Right. And 00:21:18.960 --> 00:21:23.650 it just doesn't happen very, very quickly. to 00:21:23.650 --> 00:21:27.369 coordinate no it doesn't and the fact that you 00:21:27.369 --> 00:21:29.569 know you mentioned siblings playing together 00:21:29.569 --> 00:21:34.250 or a married couple um i think is similar because 00:21:34.250 --> 00:21:36.849 you you live with the person you live with that 00:21:36.849 --> 00:21:39.529 person that you you also share a professional 00:21:39.529 --> 00:21:43.970 life with and you i think you learn about their 00:21:43.970 --> 00:21:46.390 idiosyncrasies and you learn about their way 00:21:46.390 --> 00:21:50.809 of thinking, the way they approach life. And 00:21:50.809 --> 00:21:53.710 even if you don't consciously think about all 00:21:53.710 --> 00:21:59.890 these things, I think it's just they get somewhere, 00:22:00.230 --> 00:22:03.490 right? They accumulate somewhere. And I think 00:22:03.490 --> 00:22:08.029 it's easier in a way when we are, for example, 00:22:08.029 --> 00:22:09.630 in front of the instrument and start practicing, 00:22:09.769 --> 00:22:14.589 we know each other or we should know each other. 00:22:16.079 --> 00:22:20.039 And I think we can solve problems a little bit 00:22:20.039 --> 00:22:22.920 more efficiently, or at least we're trying to, 00:22:22.960 --> 00:22:27.619 right? After some time, if you really want to 00:22:27.619 --> 00:22:29.539 make things work, you have to find an efficient 00:22:29.539 --> 00:22:33.420 way to save time and energy and sometimes even 00:22:33.420 --> 00:22:37.920 the relationship, the partnership. One of the 00:22:37.920 --> 00:22:39.140 things you were alluding to at the beginning 00:22:39.140 --> 00:22:41.900 of the podcast was how challenging it is to play 00:22:41.900 --> 00:22:46.059 four hands on one piano and just, again, You're 00:22:46.059 --> 00:22:49.980 absolutely right. I do a lot of work in my, I 00:22:49.980 --> 00:22:51.779 still do a lot of work with collaborative piano, 00:22:51.819 --> 00:22:54.119 which is what I've done for most of my professional 00:22:54.119 --> 00:22:57.259 career. You know, 19 years director of instrumental 00:22:57.259 --> 00:22:59.359 accompaniment, Curtis. So I played with every 00:22:59.359 --> 00:23:01.420 instrument and helped a lot of the folks in the 00:23:01.420 --> 00:23:03.039 Philadelphia Orchestra get their jobs with the 00:23:03.039 --> 00:23:07.819 auditions. But somehow working in this capacity 00:23:07.819 --> 00:23:12.930 is the most difficult. that I've ever experienced. 00:23:13.109 --> 00:23:15.089 And I think a lot of it has to do with just the 00:23:15.089 --> 00:23:18.269 nature of two people on one instrument. Yeah, 00:23:18.289 --> 00:23:20.289 two different entities. When you have two different 00:23:20.289 --> 00:23:22.490 pianos, and I've accompanied other pianists. 00:23:22.650 --> 00:23:24.769 For some reason, that doesn't seem as difficult, 00:23:24.869 --> 00:23:29.009 but one piano, wow. I mean, just the precision 00:23:29.009 --> 00:23:32.869 of making sure we land together, that we start 00:23:32.869 --> 00:23:35.859 together. it's much more amplified when you're 00:23:35.859 --> 00:23:38.539 both sharing one instrument so this is exactly 00:23:38.539 --> 00:23:41.660 the the reaction that our dear uh professor orcas 00:23:41.660 --> 00:23:44.640 had i i remember when i when i told him oh you 00:23:44.640 --> 00:23:47.539 know you know we're trying to develop this forehand 00:23:47.539 --> 00:23:51.619 oh i i don't want to hear about it like this 00:23:51.619 --> 00:23:53.799 i find this the most difficult thing and he's 00:23:53.799 --> 00:23:57.339 he's been a collaborative pianist almost his 00:23:57.339 --> 00:23:59.500 whole life. I mean, he's known for this, a chamber 00:23:59.500 --> 00:24:01.480 musician, a phenomenal chamber musician. But 00:24:01.480 --> 00:24:03.799 when he heard about this combination, he's like, 00:24:03.880 --> 00:24:06.039 oh no, I've only done it like a few times and 00:24:06.039 --> 00:24:08.940 that's it. Because it requires a lot of energy 00:24:08.940 --> 00:24:12.299 and time. And it is difficult. Like I said, two 00:24:12.299 --> 00:24:16.160 different entities in front of the same instrument 00:24:16.160 --> 00:24:21.740 to make it sound as one, right? To combine ideas. 00:24:22.910 --> 00:24:25.750 and music making and make it sound like one, 00:24:25.970 --> 00:24:29.910 it is, I think, the most difficult partnership 00:24:29.910 --> 00:24:33.329 and ensembleship, I think, when it comes to chamber 00:24:33.329 --> 00:24:36.630 music. Well, but when I see you perform and on 00:24:36.630 --> 00:24:40.690 the video, it just looks so easy. We're talking 00:24:40.690 --> 00:24:43.230 about what's going on backstage. I'm sorry. We're 00:24:43.230 --> 00:24:45.869 talking about backstage stuff that people don't 00:24:45.869 --> 00:24:49.369 know about. My final product is just so beautiful 00:24:49.369 --> 00:25:21.319 and so fun. Now tell me about your arrangements. 00:25:22.079 --> 00:25:26.779 Wow. Moonlight with Schubert's Serenade. Moon 00:25:26.779 --> 00:25:30.480 River. Oh, my gosh. Those combinations just blew 00:25:30.480 --> 00:25:34.099 my mind. Oh, thank you. Yeah. And then the iconic 00:25:34.099 --> 00:25:37.940 rock song Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen. We didn't 00:25:37.940 --> 00:25:42.980 do that one. We adjusted the arrangement a little 00:25:42.980 --> 00:25:48.660 bit. The others we did. John Williams, for example. 00:25:48.940 --> 00:25:54.380 We are particularly proud of that one. The very 00:25:54.380 --> 00:25:57.019 famous rock song, Guns N' Roses, Sweet Child 00:25:57.019 --> 00:26:03.640 of Mine. That's yours. I think that one was the 00:26:03.640 --> 00:26:08.019 first one where we... tried out some crazy choreography. 00:26:08.440 --> 00:26:13.019 That was the most... And actually, it started 00:26:13.019 --> 00:26:18.160 as an experiment. We did it in three days. We 00:26:18.160 --> 00:26:20.339 just threw something together really fast. Nothing 00:26:20.339 --> 00:26:25.740 to lose. And Billy Joel's lullaby is your arrangement 00:26:25.740 --> 00:26:30.380 as well. My favorite is, of course, Sweet Adin... 00:26:30.380 --> 00:26:37.049 Dobrze. Yeah, and that's an incredible arrangement. 00:26:37.289 --> 00:26:49.809 I really enjoyed it. So this is the compilation 00:26:49.809 --> 00:26:52.690 of folk tunes from Romania, right? Certain regions 00:26:52.690 --> 00:26:56.390 of Romania. And I know you, in the video, you 00:26:56.390 --> 00:27:01.609 also explain the region and also how complex 00:27:01.609 --> 00:27:04.940 Romanian culture is actually. can you tell us 00:27:04.940 --> 00:27:08.079 about the arrangements but also the historical 00:27:08.079 --> 00:27:12.640 background and how also you guys arranged this 00:27:12.640 --> 00:27:18.500 together well in terms of um um historical background 00:27:18.500 --> 00:27:21.980 you described it very well i mean it was um it 00:27:21.980 --> 00:27:26.019 was a region quite um conquered well this is 00:27:26.019 --> 00:27:28.779 a region specifically in the south southeastern 00:27:28.779 --> 00:27:31.319 part of romania romania is in the shape of a 00:27:31.319 --> 00:27:35.359 fish Right now. Right now, the Sabah fish. And 00:27:35.359 --> 00:27:37.740 what's interesting about that particular region 00:27:37.740 --> 00:27:40.759 is that this is actually where a lot of Madalina's 00:27:40.759 --> 00:27:44.220 family comes from, the southeastern part. And 00:27:44.220 --> 00:27:49.819 it's a close proximity to Turkey. And there are 00:27:49.819 --> 00:27:53.720 eastern and western influences that are commingled 00:27:53.720 --> 00:27:58.059 in that region, which lends to the spiciness. 00:27:58.559 --> 00:28:01.599 of this suite yeah predominantly eastern influences 00:28:01.599 --> 00:28:05.039 predominantly turkish because that region was 00:28:05.039 --> 00:28:09.559 for three centuries even more um under turkish 00:28:09.559 --> 00:28:13.859 occupation so a lot of the architecture music 00:28:13.859 --> 00:28:18.839 cuisine just came right there of course and before 00:28:18.839 --> 00:28:23.380 um way way back before uh he was under um roman 00:28:23.380 --> 00:28:26.160 empire right there still we remember like two 00:28:26.160 --> 00:28:31.059 years ago We visited some ruins that are still 00:28:31.059 --> 00:28:34.880 there from the Roman Empire time. Still there. 00:28:35.140 --> 00:28:39.259 It's really fascinating. I mean, learning history 00:28:39.259 --> 00:28:44.319 as a child just didn't strike me as fascinating 00:28:44.319 --> 00:28:48.099 as it does right now, finding out all these details 00:28:48.099 --> 00:28:53.200 that constitute my country. So, you know, of 00:28:53.200 --> 00:28:55.640 course, meeting Madalina and, you know, I'm from 00:28:55.640 --> 00:28:58.180 South Korean heritage. I was born in the States, 00:28:58.259 --> 00:29:01.259 but my family came from South Korea and I had 00:29:01.259 --> 00:29:06.000 never had never dated a Romanian before. I mean, 00:29:06.039 --> 00:29:08.660 instantly there was this instant mystique, everything 00:29:08.660 --> 00:29:12.859 from her accent to. And I, you know, want to 00:29:12.859 --> 00:29:16.549 know more about this. beautiful, mysterious woman 00:29:16.549 --> 00:29:18.809 and where she came from. What is this place called 00:29:18.809 --> 00:29:20.970 Romania? The only thing I had reference to was 00:29:20.970 --> 00:29:22.049 that. You had to look it up on the map, huh? 00:29:22.190 --> 00:29:24.230 Well, not just look it up on the map. All I knew 00:29:24.230 --> 00:29:26.130 was, you know, for her teacher would say, ah, 00:29:26.349 --> 00:29:29.529 Ceaușescu, Dracula. It is, you know, the home 00:29:29.529 --> 00:29:31.950 of Transylvania. I mean, all these are true, 00:29:32.029 --> 00:29:33.690 of course. Of course they're true. It's just 00:29:33.690 --> 00:29:35.730 stereotypes. Of course they're stereotypes. But, 00:29:35.750 --> 00:29:37.329 you know, I love the fact that, you know, they 00:29:37.329 --> 00:29:41.029 love it. They just laugh it off. Sorry, I have 00:29:41.029 --> 00:29:43.559 to interrupt. and you saw this the other day 00:29:43.559 --> 00:29:45.819 i was re -watching some episodes of seinfeld 00:29:45.819 --> 00:29:48.799 of seinfeld show and there is one episode where 00:29:48.799 --> 00:29:53.619 jerry dates a romanian gymnast this is a an allusion 00:29:53.619 --> 00:29:57.660 to nadia who won the perfect 10 right history 00:29:57.660 --> 00:30:00.700 of gymnastic and then he mentions the name of 00:30:00.700 --> 00:30:04.259 of uh what what am i going to talk to her about 00:30:04.259 --> 00:30:08.250 i love the accent by the way so I think the most 00:30:08.250 --> 00:30:10.869 interesting thing as getting to know her, I was 00:30:10.869 --> 00:30:14.130 interested also in her culture. And so we spent 00:30:14.130 --> 00:30:17.430 a lot of time. One of the things that I remember 00:30:17.430 --> 00:30:20.089 when I was first being exposed to South Korean. 00:30:20.559 --> 00:30:23.180 culture that i instantly wanted to understand 00:30:23.180 --> 00:30:26.680 the folk music so i got a lot of cds at the time 00:30:26.680 --> 00:30:29.940 of the traditional instruments things like the 00:30:29.940 --> 00:30:32.279 kayagum which is this equivalent to the koto 00:30:32.279 --> 00:30:35.059 the japanese koto string zither instrument or 00:30:35.059 --> 00:30:38.319 the tegum which is the the flute that has the 00:30:38.319 --> 00:30:42.000 the membrane skin membrane gives it a soul those 00:30:42.000 --> 00:30:45.880 instruments really struck my heart and so i wanted 00:30:45.880 --> 00:30:47.740 to do the same kind of deep dive for romanian 00:30:47.740 --> 00:30:51.569 music so i just spent all in search online apple 00:30:51.569 --> 00:30:54.589 music is fantastic by the way just to look up 00:30:54.589 --> 00:30:58.970 as many authentic ethnic romanian albums as i 00:30:58.970 --> 00:31:01.710 could find and it just became this beautiful 00:31:01.710 --> 00:31:06.109 journey of of the folk music of the different 00:31:06.109 --> 00:31:08.789 dance styles and hearing different regions and 00:31:08.789 --> 00:31:15.130 how they all differed and then suddenly i found 00:31:15.130 --> 00:31:20.490 two recordings of the same suite One was recorded, 00:31:20.549 --> 00:31:24.390 I think, in the 1970s or so. He's getting tangled. 00:31:25.150 --> 00:31:28.549 First recordings in the 1970s, and I think the 00:31:28.549 --> 00:31:31.609 more recent one was done either the 90s or early 00:31:31.609 --> 00:31:35.630 2000s. And what was interesting was that it was 00:31:35.630 --> 00:31:39.529 thematically the same dances, but in a different 00:31:39.529 --> 00:31:46.890 order and improvised slightly different. I recognized 00:31:46.890 --> 00:31:48.390 the piece like, well, that's a completely different 00:31:48.390 --> 00:31:51.410 way of playing such and such a piece. And I shared 00:31:51.410 --> 00:31:53.789 this with Madalena. She got excited. And then 00:31:53.789 --> 00:31:57.630 we started, I think the first step was just the 00:31:57.630 --> 00:32:00.829 base transcription, just listening. And since 00:32:00.829 --> 00:32:02.569 there were two different sources, just trying 00:32:02.569 --> 00:32:04.450 to decide which one we liked of each of them, 00:32:04.529 --> 00:32:06.710 because there was no printed sheet music of this. 00:32:07.009 --> 00:32:09.289 So it was really just simply laying down the 00:32:09.289 --> 00:32:12.630 raw transcription. And then from that raw transcription. 00:32:14.039 --> 00:32:17.259 We would, so the way I like to work is I'd like 00:32:17.259 --> 00:32:20.900 to work in a kind of a three staff system. I 00:32:20.900 --> 00:32:23.700 do the raw transcription in the middle, and then 00:32:23.700 --> 00:32:26.019 I add a staff above, a staff below for her part, 00:32:26.119 --> 00:32:29.099 my part, or whoever's going to do it. And then 00:32:29.099 --> 00:32:31.960 deciding which elements are more predominantly 00:32:31.960 --> 00:32:33.799 going to go to the primo, which elements are 00:32:33.799 --> 00:32:35.519 going to go predominantly to the secondo, and 00:32:35.519 --> 00:32:38.180 then finding fun ways to mix them, you know, 00:32:38.180 --> 00:32:40.680 to say, okay, well. This is boring. Let's, and 00:32:40.680 --> 00:32:42.380 then she would come in and say, well, let's, 00:32:42.380 --> 00:32:44.559 I want to improvise this. This sounds boring. 00:32:44.680 --> 00:32:47.160 Let's do that. So it was a very, maybe I would 00:32:47.160 --> 00:32:48.700 lay the framework and then she would come and 00:32:48.700 --> 00:32:51.680 lay all the Romanian sauce on top of it. You 00:32:51.680 --> 00:32:53.920 know, when I do my arrangement and I've done 00:32:53.920 --> 00:32:56.799 some solo arrangements, I just, I don't know. 00:32:56.819 --> 00:33:00.079 My way of working is very different. First of 00:33:00.079 --> 00:33:02.740 all, I have to be at the piano because I want 00:33:02.740 --> 00:33:05.859 to try out things and I don't work like beginning 00:33:05.859 --> 00:33:10.869 till end. based on whatever reason, I just, maybe 00:33:10.869 --> 00:33:12.329 I start in the middle or I start with the ending 00:33:12.329 --> 00:33:14.869 and I just sketch. First of all, I sketch something 00:33:14.869 --> 00:33:18.170 that sounds at the moment the most important. 00:33:18.509 --> 00:33:21.710 And then basically I fill out the rest. So we 00:33:21.710 --> 00:33:25.829 have different techniques of arranging things. 00:33:25.890 --> 00:33:28.930 Yeah, but it went through several, I mean, once 00:33:28.930 --> 00:33:31.390 the framework was out, it really took a lot of... 00:33:32.889 --> 00:33:35.230 playthroughs, experimentations. And then she 00:33:35.230 --> 00:33:37.329 has a very improvised, and that's the nature 00:33:37.329 --> 00:33:40.009 of Romanian music. It's very improvisatory. So 00:33:40.009 --> 00:33:42.130 getting her feedback in terms of, we really should 00:33:42.130 --> 00:33:44.650 do this or that. And, you know, maybe she changed 00:33:44.650 --> 00:33:47.130 her mind, but we would annotate as much of that 00:33:47.130 --> 00:33:51.130 as possible too. It's just a fun, fun process. 00:33:51.670 --> 00:33:53.869 Yeah. I mean, you know, speaking of improvisation, 00:33:53.950 --> 00:33:58.730 there are two types of people, right? Some write 00:33:58.730 --> 00:34:01.569 their improvisations down before. Every concert, 00:34:01.670 --> 00:34:03.869 even if they do something different each concert, 00:34:03.910 --> 00:34:06.049 they write it down. And now there's just, well, 00:34:06.130 --> 00:34:08.789 I'll see what I feel inspired to do on the spot. 00:34:09.510 --> 00:34:15.210 So, yeah, I mean, I like to come up with different 00:34:15.210 --> 00:34:18.210 things each time that we play this piece. And 00:34:18.210 --> 00:34:21.530 we've been playing this a lot. And I think it 00:34:21.530 --> 00:34:24.670 has been featured in every single concert that 00:34:24.670 --> 00:34:31.570 we've had. And last year we played it in Romania 00:34:31.570 --> 00:34:33.110 for the first time and we're going to play it 00:34:33.110 --> 00:34:36.349 again in September, coming back there. How was 00:34:36.349 --> 00:34:39.389 the reception? It was very well received. First 00:34:39.389 --> 00:34:44.309 of all, no one seemed to know that particular 00:34:44.309 --> 00:34:47.570 suite. So I don't think anyone had ever heard 00:34:47.570 --> 00:34:50.130 that because there's no score for it. This is 00:34:50.130 --> 00:34:51.670 a very important thing. There's no score for 00:34:51.670 --> 00:34:57.329 it. I think any folk music has been preserved. 00:34:58.139 --> 00:35:01.400 without any sheet music, right? Just the oral 00:35:01.400 --> 00:35:05.639 tradition, yes. And I think what's interesting 00:35:05.639 --> 00:35:10.460 too is that the Romanian classical community, 00:35:10.679 --> 00:35:14.219 they have a very strong contemporary component, 00:35:14.380 --> 00:35:18.349 very strong contemporary composers. But there 00:35:18.349 --> 00:35:20.369 seems to be a disconnect. And there's a very 00:35:20.369 --> 00:35:22.929 active folk music community. I mean, people, 00:35:23.030 --> 00:35:25.949 they play weddings, they play, you know, parties, 00:35:26.110 --> 00:35:29.110 community gigs, you know, all the time. There's 00:35:29.110 --> 00:35:33.929 not much overlap, which I found very opportunistic, 00:35:33.929 --> 00:35:36.010 you know, because, you know, again, one key thing 00:35:36.010 --> 00:35:39.670 about being a surviving musician in any age is 00:35:39.670 --> 00:35:42.289 finding what makes you unique, right? And I'm 00:35:42.289 --> 00:35:45.239 always trying to think of how can we... find 00:35:45.239 --> 00:35:47.500 interesting gaps to fill. And I thought, you 00:35:47.500 --> 00:35:50.179 know, Romanian folk music in the classical sphere, 00:35:50.239 --> 00:35:53.139 I think is a wonderful thing. The music is so 00:35:53.139 --> 00:35:56.940 good and not many people know it. So it's just 00:35:56.940 --> 00:35:59.199 a wonderful opportunity just to share that with 00:35:59.199 --> 00:36:01.159 the rest of the world and connect two different 00:36:01.159 --> 00:36:04.840 worlds together. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, which 00:36:04.840 --> 00:36:07.519 you're doing an amazing job. I really enjoy the 00:36:07.519 --> 00:36:11.639 video. Speaking of video, you know, you're venturing. 00:36:14.079 --> 00:36:17.340 into the virtual world where you know the podcast 00:36:17.340 --> 00:36:20.039 and vlog and you know all the videos that you 00:36:20.039 --> 00:36:22.579 make especially the one that i enjoyed watching 00:36:22.579 --> 00:36:25.360 was that sort of like a tutorial where you show 00:36:25.360 --> 00:36:29.599 us the squeegee thing uh that you used for what 00:36:29.599 --> 00:36:35.820 is it the winter morning But I really needed 00:36:35.820 --> 00:36:39.440 to see the video. I never knew you were using 00:36:39.440 --> 00:36:41.239 the squeegee. I thought you were just using the 00:36:41.239 --> 00:36:43.260 hands. And then obviously there was a reason. 00:36:43.460 --> 00:36:48.019 I have to say, I mean, it was not our idea. It 00:36:48.019 --> 00:36:53.179 was Professor Ork's idea. But it's also, you 00:36:53.179 --> 00:36:55.420 know, we do a lot of our shoots. So I'm actually 00:36:55.420 --> 00:36:58.280 vice president at Cunningham Piano, which is 00:36:58.280 --> 00:37:00.639 one of the oldest. piano stores in America. It's 00:37:00.639 --> 00:37:03.639 been around since 1891. And we have the tremendous 00:37:03.639 --> 00:37:05.980 privilege of being able to walk into the store 00:37:05.980 --> 00:37:09.820 after hours to shoot on Busender for pianos, 00:37:09.820 --> 00:37:12.800 Yamaha pianos, I mean, the top -end Yamahas, 00:37:12.800 --> 00:37:15.559 you know, rebuilt Steinways and Petrov pianos. 00:37:15.599 --> 00:37:18.059 We get our pick of the best pianos, you know, 00:37:18.059 --> 00:37:21.079 around in great condition, brand new. But one 00:37:21.079 --> 00:37:23.860 key thing is, you know, and I tell this to our 00:37:23.860 --> 00:37:27.010 customers, don't touch the strings. Because the 00:37:27.010 --> 00:37:29.230 oils in the palm of your hand can cause the strings 00:37:29.230 --> 00:37:32.250 to rust, which is why when she wanted to record 00:37:32.250 --> 00:37:35.250 this, I said, we can't touch the strings. We've 00:37:35.250 --> 00:37:38.070 got to find another way. Hence, the squeegee 00:37:38.070 --> 00:37:39.809 idea. Yeah, Professor came up with the idea. 00:37:39.829 --> 00:37:42.150 Well, you know, because he had played a lot of 00:37:42.150 --> 00:37:45.130 contemporary music, like a lot. And he knows, 00:37:45.250 --> 00:37:48.570 I think, every trick that's in the book for certain 00:37:48.570 --> 00:37:51.690 situations when you're not allowed. Because in 00:37:51.690 --> 00:37:54.550 a lot of venues, presenters might be a little 00:37:54.550 --> 00:37:57.400 bit reluctant. When you touch their pianos inside 00:37:57.400 --> 00:38:02.599 strings or put different foreign objects between 00:38:02.599 --> 00:38:04.940 the strings for certain effects. Yes, it sounds 00:38:04.940 --> 00:38:08.280 cool. But at the same time, it might damage the 00:38:08.280 --> 00:38:11.659 instrument. So he had this very good idea to 00:38:11.659 --> 00:38:16.840 use rubber squeegees. Yeah, it works. But also 00:38:16.840 --> 00:38:19.599 you are explaining in such a way that it's so 00:38:19.599 --> 00:38:21.900 engaging. It's like, aha, you know, for those 00:38:21.900 --> 00:38:25.170 who especially. are not familiar with classical 00:38:25.170 --> 00:38:27.750 music or even contemporary you know music and 00:38:27.750 --> 00:38:31.449 how does that even sound does the sound coming 00:38:31.449 --> 00:38:34.550 from piano but there's an explanation to how 00:38:34.550 --> 00:38:37.559 you do it and also you talk about Air turn. So 00:38:37.559 --> 00:38:39.420 we're going to talk more about the air turn. 00:38:39.559 --> 00:38:44.039 And then I actually have it in my hands. I'm 00:38:44.039 --> 00:38:49.840 so proud of you. We're going to talk more in 00:38:49.840 --> 00:38:52.380 details. But, you know, you talk about how to 00:38:52.380 --> 00:38:57.019 use this air turn for two people. I never knew 00:38:57.019 --> 00:38:59.780 that. I thought it was an individual thing. And 00:38:59.780 --> 00:39:03.440 you showed us how to do it. you know the video 00:39:03.440 --> 00:39:07.039 is really uh inviting and and even for those 00:39:07.039 --> 00:39:09.239 who do not know how to play the piano people 00:39:09.239 --> 00:39:11.920 really want to see that you know how do these 00:39:11.920 --> 00:39:15.519 pianists do do you do all the music production 00:39:15.519 --> 00:39:19.099 audio to visuals i i mean i can see you you are 00:39:19.099 --> 00:39:23.320 tech savvy one of you right and then so do you 00:39:23.320 --> 00:39:25.980 guys do all the production like video audio and 00:39:25.980 --> 00:39:29.420 editing yeah starting starting with the outfits 00:39:29.420 --> 00:39:33.199 and Hairstylist and makeup and everything. I 00:39:33.199 --> 00:39:35.760 take care of the visuals. She insists on putting 00:39:35.760 --> 00:39:38.960 makeup on me, which I can't stand. But, you know, 00:39:39.000 --> 00:39:41.460 it looks good. And, you know, recently we've 00:39:41.460 --> 00:39:46.389 done this. short, this reel on our favorite video 00:39:46.389 --> 00:39:50.610 game music, Baldur's Gate 3. And yeah, we had 00:39:50.610 --> 00:39:53.409 to really go the extra mile there with costumes 00:39:53.409 --> 00:39:56.510 and makeup just to look as realistic as possible 00:39:56.510 --> 00:39:59.570 with certain characters. So that's a lot of fun. 00:39:59.730 --> 00:40:01.769 Yeah. And for me, it's really kind of everything 00:40:01.769 --> 00:40:04.030 else. So yeah. Everything else, yeah. You know, 00:40:04.030 --> 00:40:06.849 I've been interested in making videos. Oh gosh. 00:40:07.230 --> 00:40:09.929 My YouTube channel is 19 years old and YouTube 00:40:09.929 --> 00:40:11.989 just turned 20. So I guess it gives you an idea 00:40:11.989 --> 00:40:14.289 how long I've been. experimenting with videos 00:40:14.289 --> 00:40:16.630 and that's just for fun again just for fun i 00:40:16.630 --> 00:40:20.130 just it's it was a hobby i i loved experimenting 00:40:20.130 --> 00:40:23.389 with editing software and over time you start 00:40:23.389 --> 00:40:24.869 to pick up this piece of equipment that piece 00:40:24.869 --> 00:40:28.929 of equipment and um nothing nothing terribly 00:40:28.929 --> 00:40:31.449 expensive but just you know i you start to and 00:40:31.449 --> 00:40:35.329 also the fact that i recorded so many albums, 00:40:35.369 --> 00:40:38.730 you know, with other musicians. So I have a lot 00:40:38.730 --> 00:40:41.829 of experience being in studios, being in production 00:40:41.829 --> 00:40:44.750 and seeing the equipment that those people use, 00:40:44.809 --> 00:40:47.809 how they use that. And I, we go to the recording 00:40:47.809 --> 00:40:49.670 session, I'd be more excited to meet the engineer 00:40:49.670 --> 00:40:52.030 than actually record the music, you know? So 00:40:52.030 --> 00:40:56.150 I love learning about recording techniques, you 00:40:56.150 --> 00:40:57.969 know, how do they edit, you know, how do they 00:40:57.969 --> 00:41:00.170 keep track of all the takes and everything like 00:41:00.170 --> 00:41:04.199 that. The challenge, though, has always been, 00:41:04.320 --> 00:41:08.340 up until recently, I've only been in situations 00:41:08.340 --> 00:41:11.760 where we had a very limited window of time to 00:41:11.760 --> 00:41:13.840 set up the equipment, record the music, and tear 00:41:13.840 --> 00:41:15.280 everything down and get out of there, right? 00:41:15.400 --> 00:41:21.289 So you have to think about planning out. And 00:41:21.289 --> 00:41:23.789 sometimes the space is very limited because especially 00:41:23.789 --> 00:41:25.849 if you were shooting in a piano store, it's crowded. 00:41:25.949 --> 00:41:27.489 There's lots of pianos there. It's not like a 00:41:27.489 --> 00:41:31.409 stage. So it's very challenging to find the right 00:41:31.409 --> 00:41:33.369 angle, set up the lights correctly so you don't 00:41:33.369 --> 00:41:36.230 have shadows in the wrong place. But the beautiful 00:41:36.230 --> 00:41:39.769 thing about making videos is that every video 00:41:39.769 --> 00:41:44.190 you make, you learn something new. And that's 00:41:44.190 --> 00:41:46.429 definitely been the case every single time. I 00:41:46.429 --> 00:41:48.210 think, you know, maybe next time I'll do it this 00:41:48.210 --> 00:41:50.230 way. Maybe I learned a lesson that this didn't 00:41:50.230 --> 00:41:52.809 work, you know. So that's been a fascinating 00:41:52.809 --> 00:41:57.150 thing. And then microphone wise, I have the great 00:41:57.150 --> 00:42:00.349 fortune of, again, working with some other musicians. 00:42:00.849 --> 00:42:05.769 I worked with one of the country's best piano 00:42:05.769 --> 00:42:10.449 tuners and technicians. And he happened to do 00:42:10.449 --> 00:42:12.789 also audio recording on the side just as a hobby. 00:42:13.849 --> 00:42:16.030 And he saw my equipment. He said, you know, can 00:42:16.030 --> 00:42:17.829 I make some recommendations on some other gear 00:42:17.829 --> 00:42:20.769 to get? And he made a recommendation on some 00:42:20.769 --> 00:42:24.849 microphones. And I said, I wish you didn't tell 00:42:24.849 --> 00:42:26.150 me that because now I'm going to have to buy 00:42:26.150 --> 00:42:28.590 them. They're very expensive. And there was only 00:42:28.590 --> 00:42:30.630 one set left. They're not in production anymore, 00:42:30.710 --> 00:42:33.429 but they happen to be just like the perfect piano 00:42:33.429 --> 00:42:36.269 microphones. And I've been using them now for 00:42:36.269 --> 00:42:38.190 a couple of years. And I think our production, 00:42:38.309 --> 00:42:42.820 it's just been really. fascinating just to dive 00:42:42.820 --> 00:42:46.780 into bootstrap ways to make a video to make it 00:42:46.780 --> 00:42:49.239 as you know look as nice as possible make it 00:42:49.239 --> 00:42:51.500 sound as nice and just having that creativity 00:42:51.500 --> 00:42:53.639 in fact tonight after we do our podcast interview 00:42:53.639 --> 00:42:56.280 with you we have a video shoot she wants to shoot 00:42:56.280 --> 00:42:58.480 two more pieces and so it's nice to be able to 00:42:58.480 --> 00:43:00.320 think you know anytime we have a come have a 00:43:00.320 --> 00:43:03.280 musical idea oh let's go make a video not only 00:43:03.280 --> 00:43:05.440 just musical idea but you know something that 00:43:05.440 --> 00:43:07.980 a product that you've been working on and you 00:43:07.980 --> 00:43:11.239 want to share it. I'm actually more excited about 00:43:11.239 --> 00:43:15.440 the outfits, to be honest. Because again, it's 00:43:15.440 --> 00:43:19.440 part of the show, right? It has to be. Do we 00:43:19.440 --> 00:43:23.860 get to see the video later sometime? Oh, of course. 00:43:26.059 --> 00:43:28.619 It's always a combination of things that we do 00:43:28.619 --> 00:43:31.480 together or, you know, I'll shoot her solo thing. 00:43:31.519 --> 00:43:33.699 She still does a lot of solo stuff. Yeah. So, 00:43:33.780 --> 00:43:35.719 yeah, whatever production, crazy production. 00:43:35.960 --> 00:43:37.480 But, you know, I don't know if we want to talk 00:43:37.480 --> 00:43:40.199 a little bit later on. We just finished a production 00:43:40.199 --> 00:43:44.860 with a young composer, Christian Meckham. And 00:43:44.860 --> 00:43:50.280 this was, for me, this was my dream video project, 00:43:50.360 --> 00:43:53.000 believe it or not, because, as I mentioned. We 00:43:53.000 --> 00:43:55.559 never have enough time. It's always a rush. I'm 00:43:55.559 --> 00:43:58.340 limited with the cameras I can use. And for the 00:43:58.340 --> 00:44:00.219 first time, we had a young composer approach 00:44:00.219 --> 00:44:04.400 Maddalena about a piece that he wrote in memory 00:44:04.400 --> 00:44:07.539 of George Rockberg. Krum. George Krum. Excuse 00:44:07.539 --> 00:44:10.900 me, George Krum. Very, very, very big distance. 00:44:11.059 --> 00:44:14.539 George Krum, who Maddalena actually specializes 00:44:14.539 --> 00:44:18.380 in. Her doctoral work has been on George Krum's 00:44:18.380 --> 00:44:22.320 Macrocosmos series. book one last year and this 00:44:22.320 --> 00:44:24.639 year she'll be doing book two and somehow through 00:44:24.639 --> 00:44:27.579 the grapevine this young man was reaching out 00:44:27.579 --> 00:44:29.280 to the music community and they all pointed to 00:44:29.280 --> 00:44:33.920 her and so he approached her to record this set 00:44:33.920 --> 00:44:37.059 of three pieces it's called three omens three 00:44:37.059 --> 00:44:39.619 little movements called the rabbit the storm 00:44:39.619 --> 00:44:43.539 silence and the face and um so he approached 00:44:43.539 --> 00:44:46.760 her with the idea of making a video project he 00:44:46.760 --> 00:44:48.699 wanted us to work together because he liked the 00:44:48.699 --> 00:44:51.039 videos that we made so he wanted her to be the 00:44:51.039 --> 00:44:52.760 pianist they wanted me to be the videographer 00:44:52.760 --> 00:44:56.340 and initially he was going to have his his girlfriend 00:44:56.340 --> 00:44:59.360 create animation so it's going to be a hybrid 00:44:59.360 --> 00:45:02.960 live video and animations mixed together to tell 00:45:02.960 --> 00:45:06.079 this visual story of the music It was a lot of 00:45:06.079 --> 00:45:07.860 brainstorming at the beginning. I remember we 00:45:07.860 --> 00:45:11.860 met for drinks, meals a couple of times, and 00:45:11.860 --> 00:45:14.780 we just started throwing out ideas and see what 00:45:14.780 --> 00:45:18.199 sticks. And eventually it turned out that just 00:45:18.199 --> 00:45:21.639 making the animations was just too time consuming. 00:45:21.699 --> 00:45:24.760 It was never going to get done. But the nice 00:45:24.760 --> 00:45:27.500 thing was that he gave me a blank slate in terms 00:45:27.500 --> 00:45:30.730 of however I wanted to shoot the video. And so 00:45:30.730 --> 00:45:33.530 my idea was, okay, let's get the audio done first. 00:45:33.610 --> 00:45:36.130 So we recorded the audio, you know, at Cunningham 00:45:36.130 --> 00:45:40.070 on a Cunningham piano on a beautiful nine foot 00:45:40.070 --> 00:45:44.610 Bissendorfer 280 VC. Imperial. Not an Imperial. 00:45:44.730 --> 00:45:46.269 This is a 280 VC. Imperial is a different piano. 00:45:46.469 --> 00:45:49.070 But we recorded on that piano. So we got the 00:45:49.070 --> 00:45:51.849 audio down and that was the backbone. And then 00:45:51.849 --> 00:45:55.650 I was able to use what we call pre -visualization 00:45:55.650 --> 00:45:59.639 software. So if you've ever seen. documentaries 00:45:59.639 --> 00:46:02.659 on how they make Star Wars or how they make the 00:46:02.659 --> 00:46:05.739 latest Marvel movie, you'll see many times that 00:46:05.739 --> 00:46:09.739 they'll have these storyboards. It looks like 00:46:09.739 --> 00:46:12.559 cartoon strips where they draw in what the scene 00:46:12.559 --> 00:46:14.619 should look like and what they're saying at the 00:46:14.619 --> 00:46:18.360 moment. I did a similar thing using 3D software 00:46:18.360 --> 00:46:21.000 where I could have a virtual model of her, a 00:46:21.000 --> 00:46:22.440 virtual model of the piano, a virtual model of 00:46:22.440 --> 00:46:24.960 the stage, place them wherever I want, set the 00:46:24.960 --> 00:46:28.050 lights virtually where I want the cameras. For 00:46:28.050 --> 00:46:30.769 the first time, I'm like, I can use my best camera 00:46:30.769 --> 00:46:34.469 and I can have any angle I want, any lighting 00:46:34.469 --> 00:46:37.570 that I want and shoot it just the way I want 00:46:37.570 --> 00:46:40.769 it to kind of measure for measure. And, you know, 00:46:40.769 --> 00:46:43.550 the music became a script and I would lay out 00:46:43.550 --> 00:46:45.869 the cuts according to what the music was telling 00:46:45.869 --> 00:46:49.869 me. it would be the changes lay out the storyboard 00:46:49.869 --> 00:46:52.869 sent the storyboard animated to the composer 00:46:52.869 --> 00:46:55.369 you know he approved and then we shot it over 00:46:55.369 --> 00:46:57.929 two days which is unheard of you know just to 00:46:57.929 --> 00:47:00.670 be able to have two whole days to get it yeah 00:47:00.670 --> 00:47:02.690 the visuals out that was great he was also he 00:47:02.690 --> 00:47:05.789 was also a big help for getting a stage to allow 00:47:05.789 --> 00:47:11.570 us to to unfold like this um we shot that millersville 00:47:11.570 --> 00:47:15.110 university there was no one there we basically 00:47:15.110 --> 00:47:19.360 had the the stage for us for eight hours for 00:47:19.360 --> 00:47:21.980 two days but you know being able to treat um 00:47:21.980 --> 00:47:26.480 the recording very much like a movie movie set 00:47:26.480 --> 00:47:28.500 it was very much a movie production you know 00:47:28.500 --> 00:47:32.420 with the way and i loved it i mean for me and 00:47:32.420 --> 00:47:34.219 i'm very grateful for christian to giving us 00:47:34.219 --> 00:47:36.840 the opportunity she played of course she played 00:47:36.840 --> 00:47:38.719 brilliantly this absolutely brilliant performance 00:47:38.719 --> 00:47:41.019 and then of course she came up with different 00:47:41.019 --> 00:47:43.940 visual elements and ideas The mask at the last 00:47:43.940 --> 00:47:45.840 moment was her idea, which I thought was just 00:47:45.840 --> 00:47:48.480 genius. And just, you know, the collaborative 00:47:48.480 --> 00:47:50.719 process. And it really felt like we were making 00:47:50.719 --> 00:47:53.760 quite literally a movie with just music and a 00:47:53.760 --> 00:47:58.260 piano and lights. That's all. I just, yes, that 00:47:58.260 --> 00:48:00.340 was a great idea with the mask. But the idea 00:48:00.340 --> 00:48:03.300 came from George Crumb's Fox Polini, of course, 00:48:03.340 --> 00:48:05.460 that the piece, the very famous piece that premiered 00:48:05.460 --> 00:48:11.320 in the 70s for three players that. requires for 00:48:11.320 --> 00:48:14.360 all of them to wear masks, to depersonalize them. 00:48:15.780 --> 00:48:19.079 So George Brown really inspired the production, 00:48:19.280 --> 00:48:33.420 not just the music. It seems like you guys both 00:48:33.420 --> 00:48:38.570 share, although... coming from very two different 00:48:38.570 --> 00:48:42.130 worlds almost, but then they share so many things. 00:48:42.329 --> 00:48:45.369 One of them is the creativity. So, you know, 00:48:45.409 --> 00:48:48.110 before we, I want to focus on your individual 00:48:48.110 --> 00:48:50.809 work and so on, but I kind of want to know how 00:48:50.809 --> 00:48:55.329 did this duo come to life? As in, did the playing 00:48:55.329 --> 00:48:58.309 together come first or the life together came 00:48:58.309 --> 00:49:02.840 first? I think they went hand in hand. Really, 00:49:02.940 --> 00:49:05.440 they went hand in hand. I never felt a separation. 00:49:07.139 --> 00:49:12.699 No. I mean, it's kind of obvious when two musicians, 00:49:12.840 --> 00:49:15.360 even if they are dating or they're already together, 00:49:15.739 --> 00:49:17.679 it doesn't matter if they're two pianists or 00:49:17.679 --> 00:49:21.659 different instrumentalists. It seems natural 00:49:21.659 --> 00:49:26.340 to start playing together at some point. Unless 00:49:26.340 --> 00:49:29.329 they really hate each other. In terms of, you 00:49:29.329 --> 00:49:32.250 know, what they do professionally. Well, that 00:49:32.250 --> 00:49:36.489 would be really weird. But we are not there. 00:49:37.269 --> 00:49:41.230 I think it just started as, well, let's play 00:49:41.230 --> 00:49:44.429 together. Let's just play together. We went one 00:49:44.429 --> 00:49:47.449 evening to Cunningham and let's just side read 00:49:47.449 --> 00:49:51.469 through some stuff. Well, I remember I received 00:49:51.469 --> 00:49:54.369 an invitation from a good friend of mine to come 00:49:54.369 --> 00:49:56.949 out to play a concert in Paris. And this is very 00:49:56.949 --> 00:49:59.510 shortly after. meeting Madalena. I thought, well, 00:49:59.510 --> 00:50:01.050 rather than me going out, I was like, hey, hey, 00:50:01.090 --> 00:50:04.090 want to go to Paris together? Yeah, but that 00:50:04.090 --> 00:50:10.329 was not why it started. No, no, it wasn't, but 00:50:10.329 --> 00:50:12.110 it gave us a good reason to give our first concert. 00:50:12.110 --> 00:50:15.650 And it was not even the goal of, oh, let's start 00:50:15.650 --> 00:50:18.369 a four -hand piano duo. It was not even that. 00:50:19.710 --> 00:50:23.329 At least that's how I perceived it. I don't know. 00:50:23.889 --> 00:50:29.460 Yeah. Dr. Buechner, Sarah Davis Buechner, have 00:50:29.460 --> 00:50:34.599 anything to do with your duo? Yes. Because last 00:50:34.599 --> 00:50:37.460 year around this time, I was interviewing her. 00:50:37.780 --> 00:50:43.179 Yes, I saw your interview. She's wonderful. She's 00:50:43.179 --> 00:50:45.659 the GOAT. She's unique. She's unique. She's unique. 00:50:45.900 --> 00:50:49.039 And I, you know, speaking of creativity, I don't 00:50:49.039 --> 00:50:52.239 think I've ever met such a creative person like 00:50:52.239 --> 00:50:57.119 she is. You know, I've been. Her student, I've 00:50:57.119 --> 00:51:00.719 been around her, I think, more than six years. 00:51:00.760 --> 00:51:04.679 Yeah, more than six years. And the influence 00:51:04.679 --> 00:51:09.000 that she's had on me as a person, as a musician, 00:51:09.300 --> 00:51:13.900 it's just, I can talk for hours. Really, I can 00:51:13.900 --> 00:51:16.920 talk for hours. And she's really one of the human 00:51:16.920 --> 00:51:21.780 beings that actively has been influencing my 00:51:21.780 --> 00:51:24.639 life. And, you know, I think yours too. So the 00:51:24.639 --> 00:51:28.940 story is Sarah Davis Buechner and I have been 00:51:28.940 --> 00:51:30.659 friends for many years, ever since she came to 00:51:30.659 --> 00:51:34.320 Philadelphia. We connected. really through her 00:51:34.320 --> 00:51:37.000 needing a piano. And then we were Yamaha piano 00:51:37.000 --> 00:51:40.699 dealers. We are piano dealers. And connecting 00:51:40.699 --> 00:51:42.860 with her initially there. And we just hit it 00:51:42.860 --> 00:51:45.179 off. We became very, very close friends. And 00:51:45.179 --> 00:51:47.920 during the pandemic, I helped her a lot with 00:51:47.920 --> 00:51:52.019 helping her set up streams for her concerts and 00:51:52.019 --> 00:51:54.440 a couple other things. So everything, if you 00:51:54.440 --> 00:51:56.820 remember that time, we were all streaming from 00:51:56.820 --> 00:51:58.840 home. So I set up cameras and microphones and 00:51:58.840 --> 00:52:01.199 helped her with a couple of productions. And 00:52:01.199 --> 00:52:04.840 then... She was putting together a one -woman 00:52:04.840 --> 00:52:08.480 show in New York called... On Pigs and Pianos. 00:52:08.500 --> 00:52:10.059 On Pigs and Pianos. Oh, yeah, that's right, that's 00:52:10.059 --> 00:52:12.940 right. I thought it was of whatever. On Pigs 00:52:12.940 --> 00:52:17.760 and Pianos. And she wanted me to be the videographer, 00:52:17.820 --> 00:52:21.400 just to record a version of the show that she 00:52:21.400 --> 00:52:24.880 could shop around to presenters. So I came with 00:52:24.880 --> 00:52:26.880 all my equipment. And that was really just... 00:52:26.880 --> 00:52:30.320 She basically hired me to be there for a week. 00:52:30.719 --> 00:52:32.559 to do shooting and, you know, capture everything. 00:52:33.639 --> 00:52:36.940 And at the end of that week, this woman came 00:52:36.940 --> 00:52:42.099 to one of the after show. I was busy editing 00:52:42.099 --> 00:52:43.860 and then finally came out for the last show and 00:52:43.860 --> 00:52:49.920 met her. And that's how we met. So, yeah. Hi, 00:52:49.940 --> 00:52:52.780 friends of the PianoPod. I want to invite you 00:52:52.780 --> 00:52:56.039 to something very special. On Saturday, October 00:52:56.039 --> 00:52:59.119 4th at 1 p .m. We are stepping out of the studio 00:52:59.119 --> 00:53:01.619 and onto the stage for our very first Pianopod 00:53:01.619 --> 00:53:04.739 Live in Concert at Stiefel Hall, presented in 00:53:04.739 --> 00:53:07.179 partnership with Manus Prep at The New School, 00:53:07.400 --> 00:53:10.099 a pre -college music program offering comprehensive 00:53:10.099 --> 00:53:13.599 and nurturing pre -professional training. This 00:53:13.599 --> 00:53:16.860 won't be just another concert. It's a one -hour, 00:53:16.920 --> 00:53:20.179 one -of -a -kind experience featuring four of 00:53:20.179 --> 00:53:23.500 our past guests, pianists, who are reshaping 00:53:23.500 --> 00:53:26.360 the classical music world. Dr. Jihoon Kerska, 00:53:26.440 --> 00:53:28.820 building opportunities for children through keys 00:53:28.820 --> 00:53:31.780 to success. Eleanor Bindman, opening doors to 00:53:31.780 --> 00:53:34.260 Johann Sebastian Bach's music with her bold and 00:53:34.260 --> 00:53:37.460 innovative transcriptions. Dr. Nana Ogwo, celebrating 00:53:37.460 --> 00:53:39.840 Black composers and honoring cultural legacy 00:53:39.840 --> 00:53:43.340 through Juneteenth LP. Donna Wang Friedman, award 00:53:43.340 --> 00:53:45.980 -winning pianist, producer, and filmmaker, creating 00:53:45.980 --> 00:53:49.099 projects that amplify immigrant and underrepresented 00:53:49.099 --> 00:53:53.199 voices. Each of these female trailblazers will 00:53:53.199 --> 00:53:55.820 perform, then sit down with me for an intimate 00:53:55.820 --> 00:53:58.280 conversation before coming together for a panel 00:53:58.280 --> 00:54:01.099 that ties it all back to our theme, creativity, 00:54:01.519 --> 00:54:05.099 connection, and community. The PianoPod has always 00:54:05.099 --> 00:54:07.139 been about bridging the gap between classical 00:54:07.139 --> 00:54:10.179 music and today's audiences. This event brings 00:54:10.179 --> 00:54:13.000 that mission to life. You won't just hear extraordinary 00:54:13.000 --> 00:54:16.320 performances. You will leave inspired by the 00:54:16.320 --> 00:54:19.090 stories and the vision behind the music. The 00:54:19.090 --> 00:54:22.389 concert is open to public and it marks a huge 00:54:22.389 --> 00:54:25.329 milestone for us. Don't miss the chance to be 00:54:25.329 --> 00:54:28.250 part of this moment. Please visit thepianopod 00:54:28.250 --> 00:54:32.190 .com slash liveevents to reserve your seat and, 00:54:32.289 --> 00:54:35.650 if you are able, support this project so we can 00:54:35.650 --> 00:54:38.250 continue creating experiences like this together. 00:54:38.550 --> 00:54:41.469 Join us for an unforgettable afternoon of music, 00:54:41.530 --> 00:54:46.590 storytelling, and connection. So let's focus 00:54:46.590 --> 00:54:50.570 on the individual work. So I want to start with 00:54:50.570 --> 00:54:55.570 Madalina. You mentioned that the work of George 00:54:55.570 --> 00:55:00.230 Crumb's Macrocosmos, and I watched, I think, 00:55:00.269 --> 00:55:04.150 yeah, you have a YouTube video out there, right? 00:55:04.210 --> 00:55:07.010 Yeah, I watched. Are you still working on your 00:55:07.010 --> 00:55:10.110 DMA from Temple University? Yes, yes. Is this 00:55:10.110 --> 00:55:12.559 part of your research? Yes, it's supposed to 00:55:12.559 --> 00:55:16.900 be. So I'm entering my last year. And it's wonderful 00:55:16.900 --> 00:55:19.559 because I discovered the music of George Crumb 00:55:19.559 --> 00:55:24.980 through Professor Orkes, who known George Crumb 00:55:24.980 --> 00:55:29.199 intimately. He premiered Little Sweet for Christmas. 00:55:29.880 --> 00:55:33.960 They were very good friends. And in one of the 00:55:33.960 --> 00:55:37.139 modern music classes with Professor Orkes, I... 00:55:37.630 --> 00:55:41.570 first heard his music, I was not familiar with 00:55:41.570 --> 00:55:45.849 it. And I remember, even now, I remember the 00:55:45.849 --> 00:55:51.150 shock that I felt. I was very intrigued because 00:55:51.150 --> 00:55:54.650 I felt that that music really spoke to me. And 00:55:54.650 --> 00:55:57.590 I think this is a very important key element 00:55:57.590 --> 00:56:00.409 when it comes to not just contemporary music, 00:56:00.489 --> 00:56:07.230 but any kind of music from any era. If people 00:56:07.230 --> 00:56:10.369 feel that a certain music speaks to them, they 00:56:10.369 --> 00:56:12.510 should trust that. They should trust that instinct. 00:56:12.969 --> 00:56:16.829 And not to mention for players, if they really 00:56:16.829 --> 00:56:19.869 feel that, oh, I have this urge, this impulse 00:56:19.869 --> 00:56:21.809 to play a certain composer, they should really 00:56:21.809 --> 00:56:25.690 follow that. So this happens with George Crumb. 00:56:25.710 --> 00:56:29.610 And looking around, I realized that there were 00:56:29.610 --> 00:56:33.400 not so many people. I would say no one. that 00:56:33.400 --> 00:56:37.820 were interested in in his music and i just decided 00:56:37.820 --> 00:56:40.760 to uh give it a shot and started exploring it 00:56:40.760 --> 00:56:45.760 and um i i'm grateful and lucky that i have professor 00:56:45.760 --> 00:56:48.659 orcas as a mentor you know to show me all the 00:56:48.659 --> 00:56:52.780 the um tricks right in in the book because he 00:56:52.780 --> 00:56:55.699 had played a lot of george crumb and um had talks 00:56:55.699 --> 00:56:59.340 with him and we we have also recently uh reached 00:56:59.340 --> 00:57:03.159 out to other friends of george crumb who had 00:57:03.159 --> 00:57:07.619 known him as a composer and as a friend uh and 00:57:07.619 --> 00:57:10.280 it's like for example uh jennifer higdon she 00:57:10.280 --> 00:57:14.400 was one of his studio students at the upenn um 00:57:14.400 --> 00:57:18.480 interviewed as professor orchis we tried to reach 00:57:18.480 --> 00:57:22.380 out to robert shannon that's still pending um 00:57:22.380 --> 00:57:27.619 another favorite pianist of George Crumb. Who 00:57:27.619 --> 00:57:29.119 else did we... Marc -Antonio Barone. Marc -Antonio 00:57:29.119 --> 00:57:32.119 Barone, yes. We interviewed him as well. Also 00:57:32.119 --> 00:57:37.840 another promoter of Crumb's music. Yeah. So, 00:57:37.940 --> 00:57:41.199 you know, getting this direct information from 00:57:41.199 --> 00:57:44.460 people that had worked with the composer, it's 00:57:44.460 --> 00:57:48.280 also very useful in my own understanding of the 00:57:48.280 --> 00:57:51.010 music, right? Besides of... my let's say you 00:57:51.010 --> 00:57:54.050 know subjective manner you know what what what 00:57:54.050 --> 00:57:56.570 do i get from this music i get all that knowledge 00:57:56.570 --> 00:57:58.610 right from from the outside that contributes 00:57:58.610 --> 00:58:05.289 to um the general um outcome and uh yeah i so 00:58:05.289 --> 00:58:08.250 far it's it's it's been a wonderful uh journey 00:58:08.250 --> 00:58:10.889 exploring that and it's still not done i'm working 00:58:10.889 --> 00:58:14.769 on the second um macrocosmos book and uh i've 00:58:14.769 --> 00:58:19.019 learned a lot about contemporary music technique 00:58:19.019 --> 00:58:25.239 in terms of what kind of sound effects can be 00:58:25.239 --> 00:58:28.420 obtained from the piano. How should I obtain 00:58:28.420 --> 00:58:30.179 that without damaging the instruments, since 00:58:30.179 --> 00:58:32.940 we were talking about that earlier with the squeegees. 00:58:34.380 --> 00:58:40.079 All these elements for extended keyboard techniques. 00:58:40.730 --> 00:58:43.530 I think every pianist should know about. I think 00:58:43.530 --> 00:58:48.929 it's a very important slice of piano repertoire. 00:58:49.909 --> 00:58:53.070 Yeah, so I feel very fortunate to play this music. 00:58:53.130 --> 00:58:55.309 And, you know, when I've played it, I also played 00:58:55.309 --> 00:58:59.590 it in Romania last year as well. People love 00:58:59.590 --> 00:59:02.909 it because they understand it, you know. And 00:59:02.909 --> 00:59:05.389 I think it has to do with the fact that I love 00:59:05.389 --> 00:59:07.849 it and I understand it. And then, you know, I 00:59:07.849 --> 00:59:11.610 share. here's what I think about it. What do 00:59:11.610 --> 00:59:15.829 you think? And so far, the feedback has been 00:59:15.829 --> 00:59:20.690 positive. It's an incredible conceptual art. 00:59:21.030 --> 00:59:24.309 Yeah. And it's very creative. I mean, George 00:59:24.309 --> 00:59:27.389 Crumb was a complex human being, complex, although 00:59:27.389 --> 00:59:29.530 at first glance, you wouldn't say that. I mean, 00:59:29.550 --> 00:59:32.269 if you hear him talking, there are lots, lots 00:59:32.269 --> 00:59:38.130 of interviews of him on YouTube. But he had this 00:59:39.920 --> 00:59:44.039 diverse, colorful, even dark, I would say, to 00:59:44.039 --> 00:59:46.360 a certain extent, universe inside of him, inside 00:59:46.360 --> 00:59:50.719 of his head. I remember Jennifer Higdon, when 00:59:50.719 --> 00:59:54.900 I interviewed him, she was so baffled because 00:59:54.900 --> 00:59:58.079 knowing him, she said, well, he was very quiet. 00:59:58.139 --> 01:00:00.920 He wouldn't talk much. He wouldn't talk much. 01:00:01.019 --> 01:00:04.159 But then if you hear his music, where are all 01:00:04.159 --> 01:00:07.800 those... powerful, violent sounds coming from, 01:00:07.840 --> 01:00:11.099 because he's not like that. So there's a big 01:00:11.099 --> 01:00:14.760 difference between George Crumb as a person, 01:00:14.900 --> 01:00:17.420 George Crumb the person, the human being, very 01:00:17.420 --> 01:00:22.960 gentle, very gently spoken, you know, like I 01:00:22.960 --> 01:00:25.679 said, the tone of voice, very mellow, and George 01:00:25.679 --> 01:00:28.079 Crumb the musician, George Crumb the creator, 01:00:28.380 --> 01:00:32.000 I would say. He's a creator in the real sense 01:00:32.000 --> 01:00:37.210 of the word. Now, you grew up in Romania, so 01:00:37.210 --> 01:00:40.110 your training, earlier training was in Romania. 01:00:40.329 --> 01:00:45.070 So did you discover this sort of experimental 01:00:45.070 --> 01:00:48.590 avant -garde style of playing when you came to 01:00:48.590 --> 01:00:51.570 the United States? No, no, no, no, no. I had 01:00:51.570 --> 01:00:54.969 experimented with a lot of contemporary music 01:00:54.969 --> 01:01:00.070 before coming to the States in 2019. I had... 01:01:00.750 --> 01:01:03.630 If I may say so, I had been at that time for 01:01:03.630 --> 01:01:07.130 many years, I had been one of the primary pianists 01:01:07.130 --> 01:01:09.909 in Bucharest, just like the capital where I lived 01:01:09.909 --> 01:01:13.809 for 10 years. So one of the primary pianists 01:01:13.809 --> 01:01:17.590 that actively was actively involved in playing 01:01:17.590 --> 01:01:22.769 contemporary music. And I just like to do that, 01:01:22.829 --> 01:01:26.090 first of all. Also, from a pragmatic point of 01:01:26.090 --> 01:01:33.000 view, it was work that I could get. And also 01:01:33.000 --> 01:01:36.500 because I like the idea of working directly with 01:01:36.500 --> 01:01:39.719 the composer. How I wish to just pick up the 01:01:39.719 --> 01:01:42.480 phone and call Mozart or call Brahms or call... 01:01:42.909 --> 01:01:45.590 you know, defy us and supplying that and ask 01:01:45.590 --> 01:01:49.289 them, hey, what did you mean by this? What was 01:01:49.289 --> 01:01:51.730 in your head when you wrote this down or something 01:01:51.730 --> 01:01:54.829 like that? But we can't. So the idea of working 01:01:54.829 --> 01:01:58.329 with living composers, it's very appealing. You 01:01:58.329 --> 01:02:02.050 know, when I read about Brahms composing his 01:02:02.050 --> 01:02:04.130 violin concerto for Joachim, basically Joachim 01:02:04.130 --> 01:02:07.070 laid down the violinistic part, right? Right. 01:02:07.530 --> 01:02:12.530 It's an incredible bond between composer and 01:02:12.530 --> 01:02:16.570 performer. Right. Um, so yeah, I've always wanted 01:02:16.570 --> 01:02:20.730 to, to go through that. Um, and it's wonderful 01:02:20.730 --> 01:02:26.230 when I come across composers that feel to trust 01:02:26.230 --> 01:02:28.750 the performer, they feel to trust me and they 01:02:28.750 --> 01:02:31.309 allow me like, like Christian, for example, right. 01:02:31.409 --> 01:02:34.289 Um, Christian Meckam with Three Almonds. He, 01:02:34.289 --> 01:02:38.550 um, remember he was not so pretentious in terms 01:02:38.550 --> 01:02:41.469 of, and picky. no pretensions but picky in terms 01:02:41.469 --> 01:02:44.630 of you know how to do certain things um he trusted 01:02:44.630 --> 01:02:50.730 me and um yeah it worked out he i think i think 01:02:50.730 --> 01:02:54.349 it paid back uh quite nicely and i'm honored 01:02:54.349 --> 01:02:56.570 when composers do that when composers trust the 01:02:56.570 --> 01:03:01.510 performer you know um yeah and also i think it 01:03:01.510 --> 01:03:04.530 also has to go the other way around the performer 01:03:04.530 --> 01:03:08.530 has to trust the composer so you've been in the 01:03:08.530 --> 01:03:12.409 united states no Too long. It's been like 60 01:03:12.409 --> 01:03:17.570 years. Yeah. Yeah. How do you like it here? I 01:03:17.570 --> 01:03:19.829 know there's a lot going on right now, but there's 01:03:19.829 --> 01:03:24.590 a lot going on. There's a lot going on. I found 01:03:24.590 --> 01:03:28.230 a very refreshing. So if I had to summarize the 01:03:28.230 --> 01:03:32.170 whole thing in a phrase, I found a very refreshing. 01:03:33.659 --> 01:03:37.260 point of view in approaching music through the 01:03:37.260 --> 01:03:39.860 people that I have worked with and through the 01:03:39.860 --> 01:03:42.579 people that I have encountered and have guided 01:03:42.579 --> 01:03:47.500 me. And we mentioned already two of them, Professor 01:03:47.500 --> 01:03:50.260 Lambert Orcus, Sarah Davis Buechner. I can mention, 01:03:50.400 --> 01:03:54.699 for example, Dr. Joyce Lindorf in period instruments 01:03:54.699 --> 01:03:57.820 and harpsichord. I've done a lot, a lot of work 01:03:57.820 --> 01:04:00.059 on harpsichord and period instruments. And that 01:04:00.059 --> 01:04:04.889 helped. shaped, that actually has shaped a lot 01:04:04.889 --> 01:04:09.909 my perspective on, for example, music from classicism, 01:04:09.949 --> 01:04:13.230 like music of Mozart or of Beethoven, because 01:04:13.230 --> 01:04:16.909 of the exposure to period instruments and to 01:04:16.909 --> 01:04:20.429 reading materials and to audio materials and 01:04:20.429 --> 01:04:24.190 to other people that are considered specialists, 01:04:24.329 --> 01:04:28.900 like, for example, Robert Levin. giant in forte 01:04:28.900 --> 01:04:31.119 piano, for example, and I had the privilege to 01:04:31.119 --> 01:04:33.320 work with him for a little bit in a masterclass. 01:04:33.739 --> 01:04:38.000 It was powerful. I will remember that masterclass 01:04:38.000 --> 01:04:41.880 for the rest of my life. And just recently, speaking 01:04:41.880 --> 01:04:46.960 of masterclasses, just two weeks ago, I think, 01:04:47.039 --> 01:04:50.539 we were in Delaware. We were invited to teach 01:04:50.539 --> 01:04:52.940 a masterclass at the music school in Delaware 01:04:52.940 --> 01:04:58.579 as part of their summer piano program. And we 01:04:58.579 --> 01:05:01.800 only had, I would say, about 20 minutes for each 01:05:01.800 --> 01:05:05.380 group, right? So it was a masterclass, right? 01:05:06.860 --> 01:05:10.900 But I was hoping, now I can confess, you know, 01:05:10.900 --> 01:05:14.639 before it started, I was hoping that at least 01:05:14.639 --> 01:05:16.880 for one group, at least for one people, we could 01:05:16.880 --> 01:05:18.860 make a difference, you know, because I think 01:05:18.860 --> 01:05:22.219 that's what masterclasses do. They should make 01:05:22.219 --> 01:05:26.079 a difference. They should be influential. So, 01:05:26.099 --> 01:05:31.239 yeah, there's a lot going on. And that's exactly 01:05:31.239 --> 01:05:34.980 why I came here. I came here to get a new life. 01:05:35.739 --> 01:05:39.360 And that's how short I can summarize it. To get 01:05:39.360 --> 01:05:43.800 a new life, to get a new perspective. And, yeah, 01:05:43.880 --> 01:05:46.119 I think overall to be more creative, to learn 01:05:46.119 --> 01:05:50.880 to be more creative with my life. And by that, 01:05:50.920 --> 01:05:56.769 I mean to experiment. to be playful, to know 01:05:56.769 --> 01:05:59.170 what I want, to know what I want to add in my 01:05:59.170 --> 01:06:02.429 life and to what to hold on to, what to let go. 01:06:02.829 --> 01:06:06.269 I think that's what being creative, since we 01:06:06.269 --> 01:06:08.929 mentioned this word so many times already, I 01:06:08.929 --> 01:06:11.949 think that's what it means at least. That's actually 01:06:11.949 --> 01:06:14.429 one of the words for this season, creativity 01:06:14.429 --> 01:06:18.050 and connection. So, yeah. Well, thank you, Marilina. 01:06:19.210 --> 01:06:24.230 It's such a joy to hear your story and how you 01:06:24.230 --> 01:06:28.570 get here and so on. So, Hugh, now your turn. 01:06:29.130 --> 01:06:34.489 So your path has taken also many turns and from 01:06:34.489 --> 01:06:37.570 Curtis and collaborated with Hilary Hahn and 01:06:37.570 --> 01:06:41.030 so on to and inventing Air Turn, the famous, 01:06:41.230 --> 01:06:45.239 you know, pedal. This, you know, for those. who 01:06:45.239 --> 01:06:47.980 are listening piano pedal comes in the regular, 01:06:48.119 --> 01:06:51.539 you know, three pedals on down at the bottom 01:06:51.539 --> 01:06:54.239 of the piano. Each one has a different function. 01:06:54.280 --> 01:06:57.500 And then now this is like the 21st century version 01:06:57.500 --> 01:07:02.219 of pedal, which we use this for page term. Right. 01:07:02.260 --> 01:07:07.760 So, and you are part of the co inventor, right? 01:07:07.860 --> 01:07:15.480 Yeah. Yeah. So how does this, entrepreneurial, 01:07:15.480 --> 01:07:21.300 innovative curiosity come from? Well, I think 01:07:21.300 --> 01:07:24.940 a lot of it came from growing up watching shows 01:07:24.940 --> 01:07:29.079 like Star Trek. It was my first love. I loved... 01:07:29.789 --> 01:07:32.670 This vision of the world where technology was 01:07:32.670 --> 01:07:35.590 so pervasive and solved so many interesting problems 01:07:35.590 --> 01:07:38.869 and was able to transport your imagination to 01:07:38.869 --> 01:07:41.329 different worlds. And I love that. I love that 01:07:41.329 --> 01:07:45.230 aspect. And I've always been drawn to fantasy 01:07:45.230 --> 01:07:48.449 elements, you know, whether in books, reading 01:07:48.449 --> 01:07:50.969 through the Lord of the Rings before the movies 01:07:50.969 --> 01:07:53.070 came out, you know, or any of those kinds of 01:07:53.070 --> 01:07:54.989 things, just wonderful exercises in imagination. 01:07:58.990 --> 01:08:03.550 One of the curious things I can look back and 01:08:03.550 --> 01:08:08.090 I think at first I was ashamed of it, but now 01:08:08.090 --> 01:08:11.329 I'm actually glad I have this, was this innate 01:08:11.329 --> 01:08:15.769 curiosity, you know, about how things work. I 01:08:15.769 --> 01:08:19.949 remember coming to Curtis very young. I was 13 01:08:19.949 --> 01:08:23.050 when I started there and attended a couple of 01:08:23.050 --> 01:08:26.100 recitals and I was just baffled. You know, I 01:08:26.100 --> 01:08:27.560 would sit there. I mentioned this at the beginning 01:08:27.560 --> 01:08:29.319 of the episode. Like, I don't know what's going 01:08:29.319 --> 01:08:31.560 on. I would ask my friends, what do you hear 01:08:31.560 --> 01:08:34.079 when you hear music? And they had a hard time 01:08:34.079 --> 01:08:35.659 explaining. And then here's a great example. 01:08:36.289 --> 01:08:39.750 So when I came to Curtis, I came in with Eleanor 01:08:39.750 --> 01:08:41.890 Sokoloff. She was my main teacher. But then George 01:08:41.890 --> 01:08:44.329 Bullett, who was teaching at the time, one of 01:08:44.329 --> 01:08:46.489 his students was not coming back. So he actually, 01:08:46.569 --> 01:08:48.529 he was the head of the piano department at the 01:08:48.529 --> 01:08:50.890 time. So he went to Eleanor Sokoloff and said, 01:08:50.989 --> 01:08:52.750 I'd like to audition your students. I'd like 01:08:52.750 --> 01:08:54.890 to take one of your students to add to my class. 01:08:55.430 --> 01:08:57.170 She wasn't happy about it, but she didn't have 01:08:57.170 --> 01:08:59.810 a choice. So all of the Sokoloff students played 01:08:59.810 --> 01:09:01.590 for him. I remember playing for him. And anyway, 01:09:01.649 --> 01:09:05.119 long story short. I became his student, but she 01:09:05.119 --> 01:09:07.479 wouldn't let me go so soon, so I had two lessons 01:09:07.479 --> 01:09:09.960 with her and one lesson with him every week my 01:09:09.960 --> 01:09:12.960 first year. Well, one of my first lessons, I 01:09:12.960 --> 01:09:16.819 brought a piece in, and then Mr. Bullett kind 01:09:16.819 --> 01:09:19.100 of went, well, who told you to do this or that? 01:09:19.359 --> 01:09:21.920 I said, well, Mr. Sokoloff. No, no, no, no, don't 01:09:21.920 --> 01:09:24.220 do that. Do this. He would change a couple of 01:09:24.220 --> 01:09:27.039 details. Well, I changed the details. Well, I 01:09:27.039 --> 01:09:28.979 went back to Mr. Sokoloff with the same piece, 01:09:29.020 --> 01:09:32.119 and she yelled at me, who told you to do this? 01:09:32.640 --> 01:09:35.920 Mr. Paulette, don't do that. And that became 01:09:35.920 --> 01:09:40.659 the very first conundrum. Who's right? They're 01:09:40.659 --> 01:09:44.020 both my teachers and they're taking the same 01:09:44.020 --> 01:09:45.640 piece of music and saying completely opposite 01:09:45.640 --> 01:09:51.880 things. Who is right? And that question really 01:09:51.880 --> 01:09:54.920 perplexed me. And I was probably a very annoying 01:09:54.920 --> 01:09:57.359 Curtis student because I kept asking that question. 01:09:57.420 --> 01:09:59.520 Well, why? Why are you doing it this way? Why 01:09:59.520 --> 01:10:01.199 are you changing your mind there? Well, someone 01:10:01.199 --> 01:10:03.060 says it does it this way. Why are you doing it 01:10:03.060 --> 01:10:07.539 that way? And the puzzling thing was that many 01:10:07.539 --> 01:10:09.920 people couldn't answer that question. They would 01:10:09.920 --> 01:10:12.100 just say, just do it. Just follow your heart. 01:10:13.159 --> 01:10:19.300 Why? How? So for me, I think the entrepreneurial 01:10:19.300 --> 01:10:24.420 question came from seeing that there was an assumption 01:10:24.420 --> 01:10:26.300 that as a classical musician, you just know. 01:10:26.439 --> 01:10:28.800 You're just supposed to know everything. I didn't 01:10:28.800 --> 01:10:32.100 know everything. And I wanted to know everything, 01:10:32.239 --> 01:10:37.079 but nobody was giving me answers. So I think 01:10:37.079 --> 01:10:39.479 a lot of that came from just being honest with 01:10:39.479 --> 01:10:42.340 my ignorance. I don't know. And I want to know. 01:10:42.500 --> 01:10:46.159 And eventually, I'm not ashamed of owning up 01:10:46.159 --> 01:10:51.399 to, I don't know. I want to learn. And so that 01:10:51.399 --> 01:10:55.600 came from that, I think, from that mindset. And 01:10:55.600 --> 01:10:58.000 that also helped me to see, well, I'll tell another 01:10:58.000 --> 01:11:02.050 story. The entrepreneurship, I think, came more 01:11:02.050 --> 01:11:05.149 out of seeing, number one, this breakdown in 01:11:05.149 --> 01:11:08.829 communication between artists and audiences. 01:11:09.449 --> 01:11:13.329 Right. Yes. I heard all throughout my upbringing, 01:11:13.630 --> 01:11:16.890 music is the universal language. Well, if it's 01:11:16.890 --> 01:11:19.229 a universal language, we have a syntax problem 01:11:19.229 --> 01:11:21.829 because most of the people just don't understand 01:11:21.829 --> 01:11:27.649 what we do. Again, pragmatically speaking. i 01:11:27.649 --> 01:11:30.270 experienced that i would go to a concert i'd 01:11:30.270 --> 01:11:32.010 be bored out of my mind and somebody somebody 01:11:32.010 --> 01:11:36.390 would play something suddenly and my heart would 01:11:36.390 --> 01:11:40.329 race and i didn't know why and i wanted to really 01:11:40.329 --> 01:11:43.390 try to be better at explaining that phenomenon 01:11:43.390 --> 01:11:46.770 first to myself but then more importantly to 01:11:46.770 --> 01:11:49.930 other audiences how can i make the music that 01:11:49.930 --> 01:11:53.010 i love so much now that i understand it better 01:11:53.470 --> 01:11:55.489 How can I pass that understanding to other people 01:11:55.489 --> 01:12:00.069 and get them to fall in love with this incredible 01:12:00.069 --> 01:12:04.369 art that is able to truly connect? But we just 01:12:04.369 --> 01:12:06.989 need to do, I think, a better job of conveying 01:12:06.989 --> 01:12:10.529 that connection a little bit more clearly. And 01:12:10.529 --> 01:12:12.149 the other parts of the entrepreneurship really 01:12:12.149 --> 01:12:15.890 came from practical things. Being at Curtis, 01:12:16.069 --> 01:12:20.210 after I graduated, they asked me to come on faculty. 01:12:20.310 --> 01:12:22.430 And then in addition to becoming the director 01:12:22.430 --> 01:12:24.170 of instrumental accompaniment, I suddenly became 01:12:24.170 --> 01:12:26.649 the director of student recitals when the person 01:12:26.649 --> 01:12:29.489 in that position died. Well, that's a full -time 01:12:29.489 --> 01:12:31.890 job. And this is back in the days when we were 01:12:31.890 --> 01:12:34.729 using lecture typewriters to type out programs 01:12:34.729 --> 01:12:37.890 and make notes. And it was just horrifying. And 01:12:37.890 --> 01:12:40.630 I thought, there's no way I can do this and still 01:12:40.630 --> 01:12:43.470 play with all the students. Luckily at that time, 01:12:43.819 --> 01:12:47.020 Computers were a new thing. I'm really dating 01:12:47.020 --> 01:12:50.119 myself here. So I was the first one to use a 01:12:50.119 --> 01:12:51.460 computer at Curtis because I just brought my 01:12:51.460 --> 01:12:54.359 own home computer there. First I used, and then 01:12:54.359 --> 01:12:56.720 I thought, if I could figure out a way for the 01:12:56.720 --> 01:13:00.880 computer to automate the process of making programs, 01:13:01.180 --> 01:13:06.739 that would be great. So I tortured myself, but 01:13:06.739 --> 01:13:10.000 I learned how to make what's called a relational 01:13:10.000 --> 01:13:13.489 database. A relational database. Simply being 01:13:13.489 --> 01:13:17.350 where instead of me typing Beethoven's name and 01:13:17.350 --> 01:13:21.590 then typing his year, birth and death year, dozens 01:13:21.590 --> 01:13:25.090 of times, or individually typing those pieces, 01:13:25.289 --> 01:13:27.810 these tables could refer to each other. One table 01:13:27.810 --> 01:13:29.810 would be Beethoven's table. The other table would 01:13:29.810 --> 01:13:31.970 be his repertoire table. The other table would 01:13:31.970 --> 01:13:34.710 reconnect to a student name, instrument name. 01:13:34.829 --> 01:13:37.829 And all those tables would come together. And 01:13:37.829 --> 01:13:40.590 then I found a way of creating programs instantly. 01:13:43.779 --> 01:13:47.939 I can go into that for hours and hours. That 01:13:47.939 --> 01:13:50.180 was a transformational moment for me. Suddenly 01:13:50.180 --> 01:13:52.140 I saw the power of computers, how that could 01:13:52.140 --> 01:13:58.119 change the operation of an entire program. Went 01:13:58.119 --> 01:14:01.439 from this being a full -time job to something 01:14:01.439 --> 01:14:04.659 I could do in three minutes. Instead of spending 01:14:04.659 --> 01:14:08.100 two weeks writing a report, instantly just spit 01:14:08.100 --> 01:14:11.319 out a 300 -page report. When I saw this, I realized, 01:14:11.439 --> 01:14:16.659 wow. Now, what if, this is back way before we 01:14:16.659 --> 01:14:19.140 had anything called a tablet, right? We all had 01:14:19.140 --> 01:14:22.859 laptops, you know, but what is dreaming? Wouldn't 01:14:22.859 --> 01:14:25.300 it be amazing if, because I was, you know, carrying 01:14:25.300 --> 01:14:29.310 lots of music in my bag and thinking. Oh my goodness. 01:14:29.329 --> 01:14:31.289 I was forgetting music in my office, forgetting 01:14:31.289 --> 01:14:33.109 music at home. I can't tell you how many trips. 01:14:33.369 --> 01:14:37.710 One time I flew out to, I was the pianist with 01:14:37.710 --> 01:14:40.369 Aaron Roseanne at one point for many, many years. 01:14:40.470 --> 01:14:42.789 And one time we flew out to St. Louis, opened 01:14:42.789 --> 01:14:45.329 up the bag and I was missing music. There's no 01:14:45.329 --> 01:14:47.869 music store. There was no internet to download 01:14:47.869 --> 01:14:49.750 the music at the time. It was just paper music. 01:14:50.010 --> 01:14:53.329 And the smoke that came out of his ears and just 01:14:53.329 --> 01:14:56.590 the shame I felt of not having my music with 01:14:56.590 --> 01:14:59.500 me. My dream was, Wouldn't it be amazing? This 01:14:59.500 --> 01:15:01.119 sounded like a crazy dream. Wouldn't it be amazing 01:15:01.119 --> 01:15:05.220 if I could have every piece I play in one device 01:15:05.220 --> 01:15:09.220 and just carry everything with me? That was my 01:15:09.220 --> 01:15:12.420 real dream. And then when Microsoft came up with 01:15:12.420 --> 01:15:15.539 the tablet PC in 2001, the first time that a 01:15:15.539 --> 01:15:18.659 computer could show a full page of music vertically 01:15:18.659 --> 01:15:20.720 instead of just the half screen we see on a laptop, 01:15:20.939 --> 01:15:23.439 that was my aha moment. That was it. I bought 01:15:23.439 --> 01:15:27.140 one, spent lots of money at the time. They scan 01:15:27.140 --> 01:15:29.619 some music, use the pen to draw notes. It was 01:15:29.619 --> 01:15:33.960 like, this is it. My dream has come true. This 01:15:33.960 --> 01:15:38.619 was before iPad. Oh, way before. The iPad came 01:15:38.619 --> 01:15:42.579 out in 2010. So now I'm thinking, how do I turn 01:15:42.579 --> 01:15:44.779 the pages? Because I can now only see one page 01:15:44.779 --> 01:15:49.399 at a time. That's where the idea came for creating 01:15:49.399 --> 01:15:52.539 a pedal, a pedal system. I jury rigged so many 01:15:52.539 --> 01:15:55.520 different pedal systems. everybody at school 01:15:55.520 --> 01:15:58.180 laughed at me they were like who is this crazy 01:15:58.180 --> 01:16:01.000 guy walking on stage with these machines and 01:16:01.000 --> 01:16:04.539 cables and pedal contraptions and playing music 01:16:04.539 --> 01:16:06.479 it just looked more like a science experiment 01:16:06.479 --> 01:16:10.779 than a classical musician but you know that led 01:16:10.779 --> 01:16:13.659 to um somebody coming sitting in the audience 01:16:13.659 --> 01:16:17.340 one day seeing my crazy invention running up 01:16:17.340 --> 01:16:19.689 to me afterwards and saying We've been looking 01:16:19.689 --> 01:16:22.250 for you for five years. We finally found you. 01:16:22.289 --> 01:16:24.729 She flew me out to Colorado to meet my business 01:16:24.729 --> 01:16:28.470 partner, Lester Karpis. And he said, we've been 01:16:28.470 --> 01:16:32.289 looking for you. Let's start a company. Just 01:16:32.289 --> 01:16:36.270 like that. It was crazy. But again, I think a 01:16:36.270 --> 01:16:39.250 lot of it was just this hunger to know, hunger 01:16:39.250 --> 01:16:43.369 to answer questions, and a hunger to think outside 01:16:43.369 --> 01:16:45.810 the box. The other thing I've always been very 01:16:45.810 --> 01:16:48.909 concerned about is Again, coming at it from an 01:16:48.909 --> 01:16:53.430 administrative point of view and seeing how dependent 01:16:53.430 --> 01:16:55.869 on the economy a lot of these nonprofits were. 01:16:56.170 --> 01:16:59.529 If the donors aren't there, that operation lights 01:16:59.529 --> 01:17:02.569 out. And everything from the Philadelphia Orchestra 01:17:02.569 --> 01:17:04.949 to Curtis Institute of Music to any other institution, 01:17:05.329 --> 01:17:10.630 they're very fragile tenants holding on to whatever 01:17:10.630 --> 01:17:12.970 the economic situation of any given environment 01:17:12.970 --> 01:17:16.229 is and thinking, there's got to be a better way. 01:17:18.139 --> 01:17:20.319 there's got to be a better economic model for 01:17:20.319 --> 01:17:23.220 all of this. So for me, the entrepreneurship 01:17:23.220 --> 01:17:28.020 is really a quest to find a better business model 01:17:28.020 --> 01:17:31.840 for being a musician, for organizations, for 01:17:31.840 --> 01:17:35.220 presenting concerts, for connecting people and 01:17:35.220 --> 01:17:37.319 music and musicians. So it's just an ongoing 01:17:37.319 --> 01:17:42.420 experiment with everything involved with making 01:17:42.420 --> 01:17:46.350 what we do sustainable. This has been an exciting 01:17:46.350 --> 01:17:49.109 journey. Well, I personally want to thank you 01:17:49.109 --> 01:17:52.170 for creating this wonderful tool. Very welcome. 01:17:52.590 --> 01:17:56.850 Yeah, yeah. I made it for myself. But this is 01:17:56.850 --> 01:17:59.909 like my second one because the first one, you 01:17:59.909 --> 01:18:02.649 know, living in New York, you just to and fro, 01:18:02.729 --> 01:18:04.829 you lose things. And one of them was obviously 01:18:04.829 --> 01:18:10.270 I lost this. So then I had to just quickly buy 01:18:10.270 --> 01:18:14.399 something cheaper. Just in the meantime, and 01:18:14.399 --> 01:18:17.319 I try that. So compared to Airturn, this cheaper 01:18:17.319 --> 01:18:19.800 version was obviously terrible. You know, what 01:18:19.800 --> 01:18:22.420 happens is like once you, you know, tap once 01:18:22.420 --> 01:18:26.039 and then just you go 10 pages ahead, you know, 01:18:26.039 --> 01:18:30.779 like that. But this one has this own like, I 01:18:30.779 --> 01:18:34.560 don't know, the perfect resistance and super 01:18:34.560 --> 01:18:39.420 intuitive. told me uh for in the video that you 01:18:39.420 --> 01:18:41.659 know by doing the forehand duet so you have two 01:18:41.659 --> 01:18:45.119 different tablets but with this one can you tell 01:18:45.119 --> 01:18:47.859 us yeah so that's what's what really unique and 01:18:47.859 --> 01:18:51.239 actually um this is something i discovered as 01:18:51.239 --> 01:18:53.880 the need was there but apparently um several 01:18:53.880 --> 01:18:56.619 app developers have built this in the app that 01:18:56.619 --> 01:18:59.720 we use for our music reading is called fourscore 01:18:59.720 --> 01:19:03.319 but there i know they're the music is another 01:19:03.319 --> 01:19:06.260 one, N -E -W -Z -I -K, French developers. They 01:19:06.260 --> 01:19:09.340 also have this capability where one iPad can 01:19:09.340 --> 01:19:12.500 be the master and it can actually connect locally, 01:19:12.600 --> 01:19:15.300 directly to other iPads and change all their 01:19:15.300 --> 01:19:18.560 pages. So it's designed really for orchestras 01:19:18.560 --> 01:19:21.260 and ensembles and things like that. But we use 01:19:21.260 --> 01:19:25.109 Fourscore. It's an option called Q, C -U -E, 01:19:25.369 --> 01:19:28.670 where one iPad can be the master and the other 01:19:28.670 --> 01:19:31.189 iPad's the slave. You can determine whether you 01:19:31.189 --> 01:19:34.409 open music together or just turn pages. And that's 01:19:34.409 --> 01:19:36.710 what I have it set to. So I'm the page turner 01:19:36.710 --> 01:19:40.729 and her iPad works with mine. And it's great 01:19:40.729 --> 01:19:44.770 because that way. Even with scores where we have 01:19:44.770 --> 01:19:47.390 both parts of one page, she can have her markings 01:19:47.390 --> 01:19:50.569 on her version. I can have my markings on my 01:19:50.569 --> 01:19:53.569 version. So our scores are really our own scores 01:19:53.569 --> 01:19:56.090 and we can optimize that and we don't have to 01:19:56.090 --> 01:19:58.029 worry about page turns. You know, speaking of 01:19:58.029 --> 01:20:00.909 page turns, in Delaware two weeks ago when we 01:20:00.909 --> 01:20:03.189 taught the master class for the Piano Institute, 01:20:03.350 --> 01:20:08.229 a lot of the time we spent on teaching the kids 01:20:08.229 --> 01:20:13.270 how to page turn. And none of them had any iPads. 01:20:13.270 --> 01:20:15.590 None of them, I don't think they had ever heard 01:20:15.590 --> 01:20:18.810 of air turn, but we got back to the old fashioned 01:20:18.810 --> 01:20:23.970 way. And we, I think for every single duo, we 01:20:23.970 --> 01:20:26.369 emphasize that over and over the fact that it's 01:20:26.369 --> 01:20:30.949 so page turning, deciding who turns when is as 01:20:30.949 --> 01:20:34.090 important as playing the notes. Because if you 01:20:34.090 --> 01:20:37.970 can't do that, then really you can't play. I 01:20:37.970 --> 01:20:42.310 mean, right. And to me, it was it was it was 01:20:42.310 --> 01:20:46.489 a joy to to teach that to them because I was 01:20:46.489 --> 01:20:50.149 taught to turn my own pages. And I know that 01:20:50.149 --> 01:20:53.590 he doesn't like that, but I do not use air turn. 01:20:53.750 --> 01:20:57.210 I have used it a couple of times and it was not 01:20:57.210 --> 01:21:02.409 a success. It always it failed. Something happened 01:21:02.409 --> 01:21:05.789 on stage and I decided that I should trust my. 01:21:06.869 --> 01:21:11.590 skills to practice the real funny thing is her 01:21:11.590 --> 01:21:13.729 you know she's she's younger you know and she's 01:21:13.729 --> 01:21:15.789 more old -fashioned than i am i'm the guy that 01:21:15.789 --> 01:21:18.770 wants to get all the tech toys in some in some 01:21:18.770 --> 01:21:22.529 ways yes and in some other ways no but it's funny 01:21:22.529 --> 01:21:26.170 yeah to to observe that um but it was you know 01:21:26.170 --> 01:21:29.050 i think it was quite interesting to to go back 01:21:29.050 --> 01:21:33.460 to the Primitive? Yes, to the primitive, because 01:21:33.460 --> 01:21:35.420 this is where things started. You have to know 01:21:35.420 --> 01:21:38.060 where things started. You have to know history, 01:21:38.239 --> 01:21:41.020 right? You have to know the past. So it was quite 01:21:41.020 --> 01:21:45.020 extraordinary. I mean, at the end of the program, 01:21:45.380 --> 01:21:49.699 at the final concert, they all did a great job, 01:21:49.760 --> 01:21:52.399 you know, just turning pages and flawlessly, 01:21:52.500 --> 01:21:57.220 I would say. reminded me of the days when i was 01:21:57.220 --> 01:22:01.579 learning how to turn pages in in such a way that 01:22:01.579 --> 01:22:04.319 it didn't disturb music and and it's a skill 01:22:04.319 --> 01:22:06.300 to be practiced and yes i agree that air turn 01:22:06.300 --> 01:22:11.020 saved a lot of time um and uh effort but i'm 01:22:11.020 --> 01:22:12.479 just saying there are still people that prefer 01:22:12.479 --> 01:22:17.180 the paper the paper and yeah yeah I remember 01:22:17.180 --> 01:22:21.859 a student a long time ago, a young student come 01:22:21.859 --> 01:22:23.840 to my office and I had invented the air turn. 01:22:23.939 --> 01:22:27.619 She's like, but I love the smell of paper. And 01:22:27.619 --> 01:22:30.899 I'm like, clearly there's a difference between 01:22:30.899 --> 01:22:34.739 where my brain is, where everybody else's. It 01:22:34.739 --> 01:22:37.079 is great. I mean, when you get a new book, right? 01:22:37.239 --> 01:22:39.239 I mean, this is what I do and I'm not ashamed 01:22:39.239 --> 01:22:41.640 of it. I smell the book. It's great. The smell 01:22:41.640 --> 01:22:44.819 of new. book of paper. So I think what's really 01:22:44.819 --> 01:22:46.899 interesting is finding ways of connecting the 01:22:46.899 --> 01:22:49.460 old and finding new ways of presenting them. 01:22:49.539 --> 01:22:51.960 That's an interesting tension between us. It 01:22:51.960 --> 01:22:58.619 keeps me on my toes. Yeah. That's so cute. So 01:22:58.619 --> 01:23:03.939 now this may be too personal. If that's the case, 01:23:03.979 --> 01:23:08.439 just let me know. But because, you know, I ask 01:23:08.439 --> 01:23:11.439 every guest to fill out the form, guest form. 01:23:12.159 --> 01:23:15.479 So that I can create a meaningful, you know, 01:23:15.479 --> 01:23:18.199 topics of conversation. And your questions are 01:23:18.199 --> 01:23:20.479 amazing. Oh, my goodness. Yeah. Thank you. Thank 01:23:20.479 --> 01:23:23.739 you. Thank you. But one of the things that you 01:23:23.739 --> 01:23:26.500 mentioned in the form that you both came from 01:23:26.500 --> 01:23:30.579 experiences where you lost everything and had 01:23:30.579 --> 01:23:32.979 to discover how to build a new life completely 01:23:32.979 --> 01:23:36.359 from scratch, a life where you had to develop. 01:23:36.880 --> 01:23:39.979 courageous creativity. So that really stuck with 01:23:39.979 --> 01:23:44.340 me. And somehow I'm able to connect with you 01:23:44.340 --> 01:23:48.060 in very complicated ways. But, you know, this 01:23:48.060 --> 01:23:52.300 is not my story. So if possible, if you can share 01:23:52.300 --> 01:23:55.979 even just a little bit of what that means. Sure. 01:23:56.439 --> 01:24:02.039 You want to go first? Yeah. I mean, when I first 01:24:02.039 --> 01:24:05.539 came to the States, all I had, literally all 01:24:05.539 --> 01:24:11.039 I had, were two luggages and $500. That's all 01:24:11.039 --> 01:24:17.060 I had. And I had to carefully select the things 01:24:17.060 --> 01:24:19.180 that I had in my luggage in terms of clothing 01:24:19.180 --> 01:24:23.079 and stuff because I couldn't afford buying. And 01:24:23.079 --> 01:24:26.279 it was basically starting from scratch. Literally, 01:24:26.340 --> 01:24:32.319 I knew no one here. I was 29 years old. So at 01:24:32.319 --> 01:24:35.899 my age, I had former classmates that had married, 01:24:36.079 --> 01:24:42.420 even had kids or were already with a job. Oh, 01:24:42.520 --> 01:24:51.180 and one year before the final move, I was a freelancer. 01:24:51.300 --> 01:24:53.500 I had never tried that. I had never been in the 01:24:53.500 --> 01:24:56.539 position of being a freelancer in terms of, you 01:24:56.539 --> 01:24:59.850 know. Leaving off concerts, leaving off gigs. 01:25:00.270 --> 01:25:04.550 And that taught me a lot about keeping cool, 01:25:04.770 --> 01:25:09.090 about not freaking out and about making connections. 01:25:09.449 --> 01:25:16.449 And this ability to make connections extended 01:25:16.449 --> 01:25:22.050 when I came here. And I learned even more about 01:25:22.050 --> 01:25:26.140 that. I remember the feeling of insecurity that 01:25:26.140 --> 01:25:29.880 was there every day, because wanting to make 01:25:29.880 --> 01:25:34.640 this big move made me give up the security of 01:25:34.640 --> 01:25:39.020 finding a job, the security of settling, I guess. 01:25:41.060 --> 01:25:45.159 For example, I started my DMA in Bucharest, but 01:25:45.159 --> 01:25:49.409 then... you know, I just decided I don't want 01:25:49.409 --> 01:25:53.189 to do that. I don't want to do this. And I realized 01:25:53.189 --> 01:25:55.930 that it was not me who started it. It was not 01:25:55.930 --> 01:26:00.689 me who was convinced to do that. It was someone, 01:26:00.810 --> 01:26:04.050 it was people around me. It was my teachers that 01:26:04.050 --> 01:26:06.789 wanted me to go into DMA there. But that was 01:26:06.789 --> 01:26:10.149 not me. It was not what I wanted to do. And then 01:26:10.149 --> 01:26:14.760 luckily, opportunity presented itself and I met 01:26:14.760 --> 01:26:17.899 the right person to determine me to make this 01:26:17.899 --> 01:26:24.039 big move and bold move and um except my mom there 01:26:24.039 --> 01:26:28.340 was no one to leave behind it was just her if 01:26:28.340 --> 01:26:30.920 I you know if I had to think of someone to leave 01:26:30.920 --> 01:26:35.659 behind and that was just her so um it was hard 01:26:35.659 --> 01:26:38.409 because Coming to a new place where you don't 01:26:38.409 --> 01:26:40.970 know anyone, you don't have any friends, you 01:26:40.970 --> 01:26:43.649 are on an extremely tight budget and you don't 01:26:43.649 --> 01:26:45.310 even know how economy works. You don't know anything 01:26:45.310 --> 01:26:47.430 about dollars. I mean, I was like, what bill 01:26:47.430 --> 01:26:50.569 is this? I couldn't even figure out the coins. 01:26:51.130 --> 01:26:56.569 And I'm still having a hard time sometimes. But 01:26:56.569 --> 01:27:02.180 yeah, it was challenging. It helped me. helped 01:27:02.180 --> 01:27:05.199 me understand better how the world works and 01:27:05.199 --> 01:27:12.840 how I work and how can I adjust myself into this 01:27:12.840 --> 01:27:17.260 new environment. It taught me a lot about myself, 01:27:17.420 --> 01:27:21.279 what I can do, my strengths, my weaknesses, not 01:27:21.279 --> 01:27:24.800 to mention that pandemic hit four or five months 01:27:24.800 --> 01:27:27.819 after my arrival, this pandemic hit. So I was 01:27:27.819 --> 01:27:32.079 trapped in my dorm room and, you know, classes 01:27:32.079 --> 01:27:37.439 went on Zoom, of course. I had a very old laptop 01:27:37.439 --> 01:27:40.000 that didn't work whatsoever. So the one that 01:27:40.000 --> 01:27:42.979 I brought with me from Romania, it was five or 01:27:42.979 --> 01:27:45.840 six year old, not even updated. I couldn't have 01:27:45.840 --> 01:27:49.800 Zoom on it. And so I borrowed a laptop, an Air 01:27:49.800 --> 01:27:54.729 Mac, sorry, Mac Air. from a temple which offered 01:27:54.729 --> 01:27:58.390 that so you know in a way um i could see that 01:27:58.390 --> 01:28:02.149 um conditions to learn conditions that temple 01:28:02.149 --> 01:28:05.289 university provided were were way better than 01:28:05.289 --> 01:28:08.569 what i what i had for example in romania like 01:28:08.569 --> 01:28:13.390 no one prepared me for this right so um and then 01:28:13.390 --> 01:28:17.399 and then i started um looking around for um churches 01:28:17.399 --> 01:28:21.119 romanian churches and i found a church on brown 01:28:21.119 --> 01:28:24.399 street i think 20 minutes or so away from temple 01:28:24.399 --> 01:28:26.979 and i started going there because i felt the 01:28:26.979 --> 01:28:29.960 need for romanian community i still wanted to 01:28:29.960 --> 01:28:33.600 you know be able to speak face to face with with 01:28:33.600 --> 01:28:37.039 people to speak my own native language we think 01:28:37.039 --> 01:28:41.399 yes So that was helpful. That was helpful. But 01:28:41.399 --> 01:28:44.899 remember the first probably three months or so 01:28:44.899 --> 01:28:46.779 were very, very difficult. I remember at some 01:28:46.779 --> 01:28:53.619 point after a month, we had just finished a studio 01:28:53.619 --> 01:28:59.819 class night. Dr. Bugner has, even now, she gathers 01:28:59.819 --> 01:29:04.399 all her students once a week and we play in front 01:29:04.399 --> 01:29:07.460 of each other. And not to mention that the pace 01:29:07.460 --> 01:29:11.479 of learning things is more accelerated here overall. 01:29:12.319 --> 01:29:14.859 You have to really be quick. Like there's no 01:29:14.859 --> 01:29:17.739 way to linger. There's no way to take it easy. 01:29:17.800 --> 01:29:20.119 After that, you learn and you adjust and then 01:29:20.119 --> 01:29:22.939 you can slow down a bit. But at first you have 01:29:22.939 --> 01:29:25.640 to, or at least that's how I saw things. I had 01:29:25.640 --> 01:29:29.399 to prove myself. There was no time to come up 01:29:29.399 --> 01:29:32.939 with excuses. And I remember, so after that night 01:29:32.939 --> 01:29:36.449 studio class, I don't know, what i played but 01:29:36.449 --> 01:29:40.329 it was it didn't go as well as i wanted and i 01:29:40.329 --> 01:29:45.770 i felt that you know i'm gonna say that there 01:29:45.770 --> 01:29:49.050 was no encouragement i just i i didn't feel um 01:29:49.050 --> 01:29:53.590 that i was adjusting there um as i had hoped 01:29:53.590 --> 01:29:57.369 so and um i was um on the stairs in front of 01:29:57.369 --> 01:30:02.630 a rock hall building and um i just i started 01:30:03.560 --> 01:30:06.239 I just lost it. I think it was the first time 01:30:06.239 --> 01:30:10.819 when I felt to just let it out, you know, in 01:30:10.819 --> 01:30:14.699 form of tears. And I saw that at that point, 01:30:14.779 --> 01:30:19.340 everybody had left home and Dr. B came out of 01:30:19.340 --> 01:30:21.380 the building and told me what's going on. And 01:30:21.380 --> 01:30:25.090 I told her, like, I'm so sorry. I messed up and 01:30:25.090 --> 01:30:27.010 everything. And there was so late. I couldn't 01:30:27.010 --> 01:30:30.930 call anyone here in Romania. I mean, it was late 01:30:30.930 --> 01:30:35.729 because of the seven hour difference. So it took 01:30:35.729 --> 01:30:40.850 me a while to, to find the pace. It took me a 01:30:40.850 --> 01:30:44.109 while, but as difficult as it was. And like I 01:30:44.109 --> 01:30:46.590 mentioned, there was a pandemic that added up 01:30:46.590 --> 01:30:50.510 to that. I would do it all over again, because 01:30:50.510 --> 01:30:55.649 I think this is how you, find answers, a lot 01:30:55.649 --> 01:31:00.250 of answers. And this is how eventually, eventually 01:31:00.250 --> 01:31:03.289 you start feeling good about yourself. This is 01:31:03.289 --> 01:31:06.430 the only way, you know, just sobbing and staying 01:31:06.430 --> 01:31:09.390 in an environment that it's just clearly doesn't 01:31:09.390 --> 01:31:11.630 work anymore because that's what was going on 01:31:11.630 --> 01:31:14.729 before. It was not working. Things were not working 01:31:14.729 --> 01:31:18.449 for me. You know, I think that's the only way. 01:31:20.180 --> 01:31:22.479 as paradoxical as it sounds, just take the leap, 01:31:22.600 --> 01:31:26.020 take the leap and see where you land. You have 01:31:26.020 --> 01:31:29.600 to land somewhere. You have to. And before that, 01:31:29.859 --> 01:31:33.819 the preparation for it, because Temple was not 01:31:33.819 --> 01:31:39.479 the only option that I had, I decided to, so 01:31:39.479 --> 01:31:42.979 I had tried three times to come to the States. 01:31:43.579 --> 01:31:49.449 So first time, I think it was Houston. They wanted 01:31:49.449 --> 01:31:51.250 to give me a scholarship, but then something 01:31:51.250 --> 01:31:54.210 happened and they just canceled it. And then 01:31:54.210 --> 01:31:57.949 I tried, I think it was Michigan, same thing, 01:31:57.970 --> 01:32:00.010 but I didn't go there to audition. I didn't audition 01:32:00.010 --> 01:32:02.689 in person. And then the third time I said, I'm 01:32:02.689 --> 01:32:04.090 going to do this right or I'm not going to do 01:32:04.090 --> 01:32:05.729 it at all. It was the third time and that's it. 01:32:06.109 --> 01:32:10.170 And I auditioned for 10 universities. I prepared 01:32:10.170 --> 01:32:12.829 and Hugh still doesn't believe it, but I kept 01:32:12.829 --> 01:32:14.710 the notebooks and the planners and everything. 01:32:16.220 --> 01:32:18.600 i prepared auditions for 10 universities across 01:32:18.600 --> 01:32:24.359 the the us and i raised money myself and i prepared 01:32:24.359 --> 01:32:26.859 everything like every single document that that 01:32:26.859 --> 01:32:32.739 goes with it the toefl exam the um you know having 01:32:32.739 --> 01:32:35.920 your diplomas legalized and sent over and researched 01:32:35.920 --> 01:32:38.420 for universities and program and repertoire and 01:32:38.420 --> 01:32:41.340 it was it was a lot of um a lot of work that 01:32:41.340 --> 01:32:43.899 i did by myself no one knew absolutely no one 01:32:43.899 --> 01:32:46.569 knew except my mom but she wasn't quite sure 01:32:46.569 --> 01:32:52.390 that i was gonna do that anyway um so it in a 01:32:52.390 --> 01:32:54.909 sense it was it was very exciting right to prepare 01:32:54.909 --> 01:32:58.189 for something like that like something big um 01:32:58.189 --> 01:33:04.850 and i was pretty much aware of what implied right 01:33:04.850 --> 01:33:08.489 but like i said it you really you really have 01:33:08.489 --> 01:33:11.430 to be really desperate to to do that and i think 01:33:11.880 --> 01:33:15.500 yeah um that that's why i i said i would do it 01:33:15.500 --> 01:33:20.840 over again just yeah because right now um i'm 01:33:20.840 --> 01:33:27.119 very grateful for how things turned out um because 01:33:27.119 --> 01:33:30.579 i've learned a lot something that i i'm sure 01:33:30.579 --> 01:33:33.460 i could not have learned being back in romania 01:33:33.460 --> 01:33:35.380 you know at some point you just have to feel 01:33:35.380 --> 01:33:38.920 when it's time to move on really you just have 01:33:38.920 --> 01:33:41.949 to feel and just have to go with that and and 01:33:41.949 --> 01:33:46.170 i'm i'm i was happy to discover similar situation 01:33:46.170 --> 01:33:49.729 that hugh went through you know in terms of we 01:33:49.729 --> 01:33:52.810 we could share and we could understand each other 01:33:52.810 --> 01:33:57.590 you know that there was a time when that was 01:33:57.590 --> 01:34:01.270 the bottom of course very very uh different experience 01:34:01.270 --> 01:34:03.489 unique experiences right right right but the 01:34:03.489 --> 01:34:07.289 core of it was was was similar you know so that's 01:34:07.289 --> 01:34:12.949 the common thing that you shared. More than music, 01:34:13.069 --> 01:34:16.310 dual music. Yeah. Equally, I don't know. Maybe 01:34:16.310 --> 01:34:18.989 equally. And the fact that, you know, I grew 01:34:18.989 --> 01:34:21.949 up in the 90s right after the revolution when 01:34:21.949 --> 01:34:24.090 Romania was opening up and it was opening up 01:34:24.090 --> 01:34:26.930 very, very slowly. And for the first, I would 01:34:26.930 --> 01:34:30.170 say, 10, 15 years, it was still the aftermath 01:34:30.170 --> 01:34:35.270 of communism. And, you know, I could see that 01:34:35.270 --> 01:34:39.399 we do have more things in common. than we think. 01:34:39.800 --> 01:34:43.000 Even if I'm younger, it doesn't matter, but we 01:34:43.000 --> 01:34:48.880 still have certain life values that make us think 01:34:48.880 --> 01:34:51.500 like, boy, it's like we grew up in the same place 01:34:51.500 --> 01:34:56.100 at the same time. Yeah. Well, thank you for being 01:34:56.100 --> 01:34:59.800 candid and sharing this beautiful part of your 01:34:59.800 --> 01:35:07.270 story. So now, Hugh, it's your turn. Well, I'll 01:35:07.270 --> 01:35:10.109 share a story, actually much younger, when I 01:35:10.109 --> 01:35:13.789 was invited by a local orchestra to do a tour 01:35:13.789 --> 01:35:17.869 to perform Rachmaninoff's, no, no, no, it was 01:35:17.869 --> 01:35:21.409 the Beethoven Emperor Concerto. They do a tour, 01:35:21.590 --> 01:35:24.750 local tour, and at the time I was studying with 01:35:24.750 --> 01:35:28.350 Seymour Lipkin. And I remember coming up to him, 01:35:28.390 --> 01:35:32.289 I was so excited. Seymour, or Mr. Lipkin, I'm 01:35:32.289 --> 01:35:33.689 going to play the Emperor Concerto with such 01:35:33.689 --> 01:35:35.770 and such an orchestra. And he looked at me and 01:35:35.770 --> 01:35:41.520 said, No, you're not. You're not ready. I was 01:35:41.520 --> 01:35:47.039 so devastated. And he just said, call the conductor, 01:35:47.220 --> 01:35:49.899 cancel the tour. You're not ready. I'm not going 01:35:49.899 --> 01:35:57.300 to permit it. I remember feeling so angry, so 01:35:57.300 --> 01:36:03.340 disappointed. I was in shock. I mean, I was never 01:36:03.340 --> 01:36:05.800 told I can't do something. There's an opportunity, 01:36:06.100 --> 01:36:10.939 you know? And so I did something very interesting. 01:36:14.260 --> 01:36:17.060 I drove out to the local hobby store back when 01:36:17.060 --> 01:36:19.220 we had hobby stores. I bought a model of the 01:36:19.220 --> 01:36:23.600 USS Enterprise. And I stayed up all night. I 01:36:23.600 --> 01:36:26.340 didn't get any sleep. I just stayed up all night. 01:36:27.310 --> 01:36:30.430 Building this model enterprise, the decals, I 01:36:30.430 --> 01:36:35.689 was so angry. And the only way I could get this 01:36:35.689 --> 01:36:38.890 anger or this emptiness out was to build something. 01:36:39.329 --> 01:36:42.470 It sounds strange. By the morning, I had this 01:36:42.470 --> 01:36:45.369 beautiful model of the Starship Enterprise. Kind 01:36:45.369 --> 01:36:47.390 of worked out my anger. And I decided, you know 01:36:47.390 --> 01:36:51.229 what? I'm going to do it anyway. I played the 01:36:51.229 --> 01:36:54.510 concerto. I performed with it. And I've gone 01:36:54.510 --> 01:36:57.300 since. had a chance to perform that Ampere Concerto 01:36:57.300 --> 01:37:01.380 many times afterwards. And, and I'm really glad 01:37:01.380 --> 01:37:04.760 that as a youngster, I had the courage to defy 01:37:04.760 --> 01:37:07.699 my classical music. You never defy your teacher. 01:37:07.779 --> 01:37:11.140 I, you know, I just, it was, I thought that was 01:37:11.140 --> 01:37:14.520 the wrong way to do it. You know, for me, I'd 01:37:14.520 --> 01:37:17.520 rather perform and make a mistake. Then he was 01:37:17.520 --> 01:37:18.939 the kind of person, he was kind of teacher that 01:37:18.939 --> 01:37:22.880 was so afraid of, he, he would play a concert. 01:37:23.520 --> 01:37:25.819 And we'd be just like, oh, Mr. Lipkin, that was 01:37:25.819 --> 01:37:27.840 incredible. That was wonderful. And he'd be just 01:37:27.840 --> 01:37:31.180 like beating himself up and just couldn't allow 01:37:31.180 --> 01:37:34.100 himself to enjoy the beautiful music he made. 01:37:34.180 --> 01:37:37.119 I'm like, where is this coming, this self -masochism, 01:37:37.119 --> 01:37:40.739 you know? And it just, I couldn't do that, you 01:37:40.739 --> 01:37:43.979 know? Fast forward, you know, many years there 01:37:43.979 --> 01:37:46.300 have been situations where, yes, and I've had 01:37:46.300 --> 01:37:48.939 my share of beating myself up too. One of the 01:37:48.939 --> 01:37:51.340 patterns I've seen. There was one, there was 01:37:51.340 --> 01:37:53.720 one particular incident where, well, one episode 01:37:53.720 --> 01:37:56.680 of my life where just everything was gone. I 01:37:56.680 --> 01:38:00.760 was very, I was just kind of rock bottom. And 01:38:00.760 --> 01:38:05.079 I decided to go and start a business. Another 01:38:05.079 --> 01:38:09.380 separate business. Okay. Just all in this whole 01:38:09.380 --> 01:38:13.180 new business. And it was a collaboration. And 01:38:13.180 --> 01:38:15.380 at first it was great, you know, and then it 01:38:15.380 --> 01:38:18.439 just, you know. Took my mind, you know, focused 01:38:18.439 --> 01:38:21.479 my energies. And, you know, I felt a lot of loss, 01:38:21.560 --> 01:38:23.279 but I felt like I was building something new 01:38:23.279 --> 01:38:27.119 through this. Well, a few months into it, we 01:38:27.119 --> 01:38:30.680 had a big, big disagreement in terms of how things 01:38:30.680 --> 01:38:33.180 should run. Clearly some miscommunication because 01:38:33.180 --> 01:38:36.420 it was quite successful. We had this miscommunication. 01:38:36.699 --> 01:38:39.619 And then I, and again, here I am again, rock 01:38:39.619 --> 01:38:42.550 bottom. I'm about to lose this whole new venture 01:38:42.550 --> 01:38:45.869 that I just spent all this time and energy investing 01:38:45.869 --> 01:38:50.590 myself in. What did I do? I started a podcast. 01:38:50.869 --> 01:38:54.130 I threw myself in. This is my old podcast called 01:38:54.130 --> 01:38:57.050 A Musical Life, and I went on to interview some 01:38:57.050 --> 01:39:01.270 pretty amazing musicians. I interviewed people 01:39:01.270 --> 01:39:05.069 like Peter Schickley before he died. PDQ Buck. 01:39:05.250 --> 01:39:08.979 PDQ Buck, and also... Yeah, time for three when 01:39:08.979 --> 01:39:11.699 they were just getting started. Yo -Yo Ma. Yo 01:39:11.699 --> 01:39:15.060 -Yo Ma. Actually, yeah. Sony Productions actually 01:39:15.060 --> 01:39:16.979 reached out to me and just said, you know, they 01:39:16.979 --> 01:39:20.479 were inviting podcasters to come out and interview 01:39:20.479 --> 01:39:23.300 the Silk Road Ensemble. They were releasing a 01:39:23.300 --> 01:39:25.399 new album. So I thought I would be, you know, 01:39:25.439 --> 01:39:27.399 one of, you know, dozens of people in the room 01:39:27.399 --> 01:39:30.279 or something. But I went up to New York City. 01:39:30.359 --> 01:39:34.270 I was the only podcaster. Yeah, it's a really 01:39:34.270 --> 01:39:36.909 new thing. Yeah, so I was the only podcaster. 01:39:36.989 --> 01:39:38.649 I got to interview like two or three people in 01:39:38.649 --> 01:39:40.130 the radio station. Then they brought me into 01:39:40.130 --> 01:39:42.409 the radio booth where I got to set up my camera 01:39:42.409 --> 01:39:45.930 and interview Yo -Yo Ma. Oh, wow. It was kind 01:39:45.930 --> 01:39:51.069 of cool. Yeah, he's a great guy. So the podcast 01:39:51.069 --> 01:39:54.729 went really, really. So I've had these, if there's 01:39:54.729 --> 01:39:59.279 a pattern that I've noticed in my life, when 01:39:59.279 --> 01:40:02.539 things are taken away from me or I'm very, very 01:40:02.539 --> 01:40:07.520 disappointed. My therapy is just to go on a creative 01:40:07.520 --> 01:40:12.800 binge. And again, I don't know how I would teach 01:40:12.800 --> 01:40:16.039 this, but some of the best creativities have 01:40:16.039 --> 01:40:18.460 been when I've been forced out of absolute desperation 01:40:18.460 --> 01:40:23.260 or despair or just frustration, just a feeling 01:40:23.260 --> 01:40:27.699 like I've hit a brick wall in something. And 01:40:27.699 --> 01:40:30.979 then my brain just goes and just latches on to, 01:40:31.079 --> 01:40:33.500 maybe I'll just start a new hobby. I remember 01:40:33.500 --> 01:40:36.140 starting to teach myself how to shoot a bow, 01:40:36.260 --> 01:40:38.039 you know, the recurve bow just from scratch. 01:40:38.560 --> 01:40:42.039 Out of nothing, you know. And these kinds of 01:40:42.039 --> 01:40:45.199 creative, I think there's a lot of validity to 01:40:45.199 --> 01:40:48.300 some of the greatest art comes from our greatest 01:40:48.300 --> 01:40:52.279 loss or our greatest moments of despair where 01:40:52.279 --> 01:40:57.289 the creativity becomes a healing mechanism. You 01:40:57.289 --> 01:40:59.810 know, where something, you know, if you feel 01:40:59.810 --> 01:41:01.750 like something beautiful, something positive 01:41:01.750 --> 01:41:04.510 is coming out of all this desperation or all 01:41:04.510 --> 01:41:07.789 this frustration. That's just been the pattern 01:41:07.789 --> 01:41:10.430 of my life. I've seen this over and over again. 01:41:10.750 --> 01:41:14.609 Not that I welcome the terrible, desperate, awful 01:41:14.609 --> 01:41:19.310 times. No one wants that. But I think when you're 01:41:19.310 --> 01:41:22.409 an artist, and I'm going to even put this out 01:41:22.409 --> 01:41:24.350 there, even for folks who don't think that they 01:41:24.350 --> 01:41:28.699 are artists. There are always artistic venues 01:41:28.699 --> 01:41:34.500 that anybody can reach towards to channel, you 01:41:34.500 --> 01:41:36.880 know, channel this frustration, channel this 01:41:36.880 --> 01:41:39.000 despair, channel the loneliness, channel the 01:41:39.000 --> 01:41:42.800 loss. You know, we can do it destructively. We 01:41:42.800 --> 01:41:45.359 can drink a lot. We can ingest things. We can, 01:41:45.399 --> 01:41:47.659 you know, really take things that either numb 01:41:47.659 --> 01:41:51.300 us, right? And I've been in that period of time 01:41:51.300 --> 01:41:55.739 too. I've been too. Or we can take that. and 01:41:55.739 --> 01:42:00.380 then rechannel it into something that, you know, 01:42:00.380 --> 01:42:04.239 it can be learning something brand new for the 01:42:04.239 --> 01:42:28.560 first time. Thank you so much. I mean, we are 01:42:28.560 --> 01:42:32.460 coming toward the end of the conversation. So 01:42:32.460 --> 01:42:37.100 what I want is let's promote. The floor is yours. 01:42:37.180 --> 01:42:39.859 So tell us what you have coming up and where 01:42:39.859 --> 01:42:42.960 our listeners can experience more of your music. 01:42:43.180 --> 01:42:45.439 Oh, so this is coming out at the end. At the 01:42:45.439 --> 01:42:48.779 time of this publication, it's the end of September. 01:42:50.239 --> 01:42:55.890 We have... Just to check our website. And one 01:42:55.890 --> 01:42:59.350 of the things that we're being more active with 01:42:59.350 --> 01:43:02.590 is certainly getting our newsletter ramped up. 01:43:02.609 --> 01:43:04.149 We haven't actually done a newsletter in a while. 01:43:04.229 --> 01:43:06.350 We're getting that back up again. So I encourage 01:43:06.350 --> 01:43:11.109 you to join our newsletter list and go to matahew 01:43:11.109 --> 01:43:15.229 .com. There's a whole list of the concerts that 01:43:15.229 --> 01:43:16.890 we have coming up. We've got a number of concerts 01:43:16.890 --> 01:43:19.149 already booked at this point, and we're going 01:43:19.149 --> 01:43:24.159 to continue to be booking more things. more projects 01:43:24.159 --> 01:43:28.619 in terms of video projects. We're going to be 01:43:28.619 --> 01:43:31.180 doing more forehand videos and stuff. So there's 01:43:31.180 --> 01:43:34.420 always going to be something, but be sure to 01:43:34.420 --> 01:43:37.020 sign up because we may be coming to a town near 01:43:37.020 --> 01:43:39.779 you. So check out our concert tour list on our 01:43:39.779 --> 01:43:42.920 website at matahew .com. Sure. And then you're 01:43:42.920 --> 01:43:46.619 also active on Instagram, TikTok. I mean, I got 01:43:46.619 --> 01:43:50.319 a message from you. He's on TikTok. I'm on Instagram. 01:43:51.159 --> 01:43:54.399 Yeah, we share that. Great. And the Facebook 01:43:54.399 --> 01:43:57.760 and so on. So that people can connect with you. 01:43:57.880 --> 01:44:02.140 Yep. Great. Now, before the rapid fire questions, 01:44:02.340 --> 01:44:06.439 is there anything else? Are we good? Can we move 01:44:06.439 --> 01:44:07.840 on to that? I think we're good. I mean, I think 01:44:07.840 --> 01:44:09.060 the thing to be looking out for is we're going 01:44:09.060 --> 01:44:11.039 to be working on a series of educational content. 01:44:11.619 --> 01:44:14.460 Oh, wonderful. That's developing. Yes, we're 01:44:14.460 --> 01:44:16.960 developing actually a history of forehand piano 01:44:16.960 --> 01:44:19.500 music. We're going to be looking at, I think 01:44:19.500 --> 01:44:22.859 partly we were just so inspired by being guest 01:44:22.859 --> 01:44:25.739 teachers at this piano institute and running 01:44:25.739 --> 01:44:29.119 into so many interesting compositions. that were 01:44:29.119 --> 01:44:31.920 so expertly curated by Lotus Cheng, who was the 01:44:31.920 --> 01:44:34.520 director of the program there. I mean, I was 01:44:34.520 --> 01:44:36.460 so impressed with how she was able to find such 01:44:36.460 --> 01:44:38.479 disparate pieces that matched the levels of the 01:44:38.479 --> 01:44:42.380 kids. We want to do a deep dive to sharing more 01:44:42.380 --> 01:44:45.159 of the repertoire, not only from the classical 01:44:45.159 --> 01:44:48.039 period, but also what's being published now that's 01:44:48.039 --> 01:44:50.539 worth for, you know, we want to become a resource 01:44:50.539 --> 01:44:54.829 for teachers. so that we can help teachers and 01:44:54.829 --> 01:44:56.810 publishers and composers. And so we want to try 01:44:56.810 --> 01:44:59.729 to be a nexus for folks who want to explore the 01:44:59.729 --> 01:45:01.930 forehand literature more. So that's going to 01:45:01.930 --> 01:45:04.069 be an ongoing project. So a lot of resources 01:45:04.069 --> 01:45:06.010 we're developing for that too. Yeah. And also 01:45:06.010 --> 01:45:10.109 a new repertoire to learn. We have a work by 01:45:10.109 --> 01:45:15.149 a Hungarian composer, Peter Wolf, very good friends 01:45:15.149 --> 01:45:19.310 with Sarah Davis Bugner. Oh, I remember. Yes. 01:45:19.449 --> 01:45:24.430 Yeah. some of his Wolf tempered clavier pieces. 01:45:24.649 --> 01:45:28.189 Oh yeah, that's right. Yes. Very imaginative 01:45:28.189 --> 01:45:33.189 and creative music. And yeah, he wrote, I believe 01:45:33.189 --> 01:45:36.970 he wrote a forehand piano piece for us that we 01:45:36.970 --> 01:45:39.489 have not recorded yet. So we have to do this. 01:45:39.529 --> 01:45:42.689 We have this, this, this little bucket list of 01:45:42.689 --> 01:45:47.649 repertoire pieces that we have to. dive in any 01:45:47.649 --> 01:45:52.329 of your arrangements available as a score yeah 01:45:52.329 --> 01:45:54.210 actually curiously enough if you come to our 01:45:54.210 --> 01:45:58.029 patreon page our patreon page is where we usually 01:45:58.029 --> 01:46:01.100 post our arrangements Not all of them, but many 01:46:01.100 --> 01:46:03.819 of them. We have to be careful because I know 01:46:03.819 --> 01:46:05.859 with the John Williams estate, we're not allowed 01:46:05.859 --> 01:46:10.119 to post our John Williams arrangements. To monetize, 01:46:10.119 --> 01:46:14.140 actually. But if you become a Patreon supporter 01:46:14.140 --> 01:46:16.119 on our Patreon page, I mean, first of all, we 01:46:16.119 --> 01:46:18.920 would really appreciate it. And that's where 01:46:18.920 --> 01:46:22.399 we distribute all of our, you know, what we can. 01:46:22.399 --> 01:46:24.680 We distribute our scores there. Great. Well, 01:46:24.880 --> 01:46:28.109 before I let you go. We have one more thing to 01:46:28.109 --> 01:46:30.350 do, the PianoPod rapid -fire questions. Now, 01:46:30.430 --> 01:46:33.810 we take this segment very seriously. You've shared 01:46:33.810 --> 01:46:36.789 stories and expertise today, but these questions, 01:46:36.949 --> 01:46:39.789 the upcoming questions, carefully curated by 01:46:39.789 --> 01:46:44.090 my team, me, will give our listeners a glimpse 01:46:44.090 --> 01:46:48.909 into who you truly are. So let's do this. What 01:46:48.909 --> 01:46:55.409 is your comfort food? Cauliflower pizza. Curried 01:46:55.409 --> 01:46:59.000 ribs. How do you like your coffee in the morning? 01:46:59.460 --> 01:47:03.020 Medium roast with homemade almond milk, cinnamon, 01:47:03.180 --> 01:47:07.319 and cardamom. Recently discovered this new mushroom 01:47:07.319 --> 01:47:09.899 coffee. So now it's going to be black coffee 01:47:09.899 --> 01:47:13.119 with her homemade almond milk. She makes an amazing 01:47:13.119 --> 01:47:17.420 homemade almond milk and mushroom coffee all 01:47:17.420 --> 01:47:21.619 mixed together with some agave. Wow. Very specific, 01:47:21.720 --> 01:47:25.180 you guys. Yeah. Next question. Sunrise or sunset? 01:47:25.899 --> 01:47:32.039 Sunrise. Sunset. Summer or winter? Summer. Winter. 01:47:32.699 --> 01:47:39.659 Level two. What skill have you always wanted 01:47:39.659 --> 01:47:42.880 to learn but haven't had a chance to? Dance. 01:47:43.260 --> 01:47:46.500 Romanian. Romanian. Oh. And we're still working 01:47:46.500 --> 01:47:50.039 on it. I'm still not very good. I can say one 01:47:50.039 --> 01:47:58.300 sentence in Romanian. I can say, That's great. 01:48:01.039 --> 01:48:03.920 Did you understand? Yeah, they are. No, she is 01:48:03.920 --> 01:48:07.680 my friend. Oh, my friend. Okay, cool. That's 01:48:07.680 --> 01:48:16.079 so cool. I had a Romanian roommate in college. 01:48:16.199 --> 01:48:19.199 Oh, there you go. Yeah, there we go. Right. What 01:48:19.199 --> 01:48:23.409 is your word or words to live by? Carpe diem, 01:48:23.609 --> 01:48:26.590 music making, you know, stuff like that. Depends 01:48:26.590 --> 01:48:30.510 on the mood and day. Create something. Favorite 01:48:30.510 --> 01:48:36.310 venue you have ever performed in. Carnegie. Carnegie. 01:48:36.310 --> 01:48:38.149 Carnegie's Ankle Hall, that's for sure, yeah. 01:48:38.569 --> 01:48:41.369 What is the most important quality you look for 01:48:41.369 --> 01:48:45.569 in other people? Creativity and craziness. Sense 01:48:45.569 --> 01:48:49.409 of humor. Name a composer you wish more people 01:48:49.409 --> 01:48:54.829 knew about. George Crumb. Mel Boni. All right. 01:48:54.850 --> 01:48:58.329 Two more questions. Name one piece in your current 01:48:58.329 --> 01:49:02.130 playlist. Doesn't matter the genre is. Wait, 01:49:02.270 --> 01:49:04.770 I'll retract my answer. You go, you go. I want 01:49:04.770 --> 01:49:06.689 to think about it. Hey, hey, we're the monkeys. 01:49:06.909 --> 01:49:15.210 I don't know. Thunderstruck. ACDC. Okay. All 01:49:15.210 --> 01:49:18.409 right. There we go. All right. Last question. 01:49:18.489 --> 01:49:23.909 Fill in the blank. Music is blank. Music is the 01:49:23.909 --> 01:49:31.970 most expressive and powerful tool to connect 01:49:31.970 --> 01:49:36.989 people. Music is food. Music is food. Oh, this 01:49:36.989 --> 01:49:40.750 is the first one. This is a very pragmatic. Ding, 01:49:40.750 --> 01:49:43.829 ding. Congratulations. Well, you know, it's something, 01:49:44.149 --> 01:49:48.289 like I said, I... I didn't realize those three 01:49:48.289 --> 01:49:50.649 years that I was in a drought. I didn't realize 01:49:50.649 --> 01:49:53.949 it until I was actually fed again. And then I 01:49:53.949 --> 01:49:56.590 realized how hungry I was and how much I needed. 01:49:56.750 --> 01:50:01.699 So, yes, for me, music is food. Great. Madalina 01:50:01.699 --> 01:50:03.819 and Hugh, thank you so much for joining us today. 01:50:04.020 --> 01:50:05.899 Oh, my goodness, Yukiko. Thank you so much for 01:50:05.899 --> 01:50:09.819 the wonderful questions. Yeah, your podcast is 01:50:09.819 --> 01:50:12.500 just incredible. I think I don't know anyone 01:50:12.500 --> 01:50:16.979 to do this. And to edit it and to do, yes. This 01:50:16.979 --> 01:50:19.399 kind of depth. The depth of your questions, yeah, 01:50:19.420 --> 01:50:21.020 and discussion. Yeah, but, you know, just like 01:50:21.020 --> 01:50:23.520 what you do and creativity and so on, and then 01:50:23.520 --> 01:50:26.220 you just obsess and you do it, that sort of thing. 01:50:26.420 --> 01:50:28.560 And it's the same thing for me. And then this 01:50:28.560 --> 01:50:32.310 is giving me, a lot of, you know, many, so many 01:50:32.310 --> 01:50:36.090 things. So it's just being able to talk to artists. 01:50:36.170 --> 01:50:38.390 I mean, without this platform, I would never 01:50:38.390 --> 01:50:41.229 have met you guys to begin with. And then this 01:50:41.229 --> 01:50:43.970 has been a really wonderful conversation. Yeah. 01:50:44.210 --> 01:50:46.810 It was because of Dr. Buechner in a way because 01:50:46.810 --> 01:50:49.810 she was, yeah. But hopefully next, hopefully 01:50:49.810 --> 01:50:51.409 next time we were in Brooklyn, if we get a chance, 01:50:51.430 --> 01:50:53.850 we'd have to grab some dinner together. Oh, yeah. 01:50:53.850 --> 01:50:56.050 Sounds great. We're not too far each other. So 01:50:56.050 --> 01:50:59.420 we need to hang out. Yes, definitely. Yeah. So 01:50:59.420 --> 01:51:03.560 anyway, going back. So, I mean, we really appreciate 01:51:03.560 --> 01:51:06.939 you being here and sharing your journey and really 01:51:06.939 --> 01:51:11.159 being candid with your stories and opinions. 01:51:11.319 --> 01:51:14.119 So to our audience, if you'd like to explore 01:51:14.119 --> 01:51:17.380 more of Mada and Hugh's work, visit their website 01:51:17.380 --> 01:51:20.939 at madahugh .com and follow their YouTube channel 01:51:20.939 --> 01:51:25.300 at Mada Hugh Piano Duo for the latest performances, 01:51:25.500 --> 01:51:28.939 arrangements, and so on. with them on Instagram, 01:51:29.140 --> 01:51:32.060 TikTok, Facebook, and support their work through 01:51:32.060 --> 01:51:34.979 Patreon. You can find all the links in the show 01:51:34.979 --> 01:51:37.460 notes. And of course, a huge thank you to all 01:51:37.460 --> 01:51:39.920 of you, our faithful fans and listeners for tuning 01:51:39.920 --> 01:51:42.300 in. If you enjoyed today's episode, please give 01:51:42.300 --> 01:51:46.039 it a thumbs up and subscribe. I saw a lot of 01:51:46.039 --> 01:51:48.340 thumbs up popping out. I didn't know what they 01:51:48.340 --> 01:51:51.460 were. I know, right? It's just a platform thing. 01:51:51.960 --> 01:51:54.439 Yeah, I have to figure it out. But please share 01:51:54.439 --> 01:51:56.539 and review this episode on your favorite social 01:51:56.539 --> 01:51:59.140 media platform and tag the Pianapod. It's one 01:51:59.140 --> 01:52:01.779 of the best ways to help our community grow and 01:52:01.779 --> 01:52:04.380 we love hearing your feedback. For the latest 01:52:04.380 --> 01:52:07.840 updates, the guest news and stories that spark 01:52:07.840 --> 01:52:10.140 creativity and connection, follow the Pianapod 01:52:10.140 --> 01:52:12.960 on Substack, TikTok, and LinkedIn. I'll see you 01:52:12.960 --> 01:52:15.359 in the next episode of the Pianapod. Thank you, 01:52:15.380 --> 01:52:19.010 Mara and Hugh. Thank you. Take care. Thank you. 01:52:19.010 --> 01:52:22.750 Say bye. Oh, bye. Bye. Bye.