Shanghai Symphony Orchestra welcomes cellist home with special concert
The Shanghai Symphony Orchestra welcomes the return of cellist Wang Jian for a special concert.
Renowned cellist Wang Jian performed for his home audience in Shanghai for the first time in three years earlier this week.
The 55-year-old musician recently returned to the city to teach at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music. He has also received invitations for concerts, including recitals, from all around the country. His first concert and first recital are both in Shanghai.
"You don't have a lot of world-class musicians today, and Wang Jian is definitely one of them," said Yu Long, artistic director of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, which performed with the maestro in his first return concert "Salute to Wang Jian."
"It was through musicians like Wang Jian that the world has got to know about Chinese music and Chinese culture since the reform and opening-up."
Wang Jian (right) made his professional debut at the age of 12.
Wang first became known to international audiences through the 1979 documentary "From Mao to Mozart: Isaac Stern in China." He was then aged 10 and one of the featured music students in the film.
He made his professional debut two years later, with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra at a Children's Day concert in 1981. It was his first collaboration with the orchestra and Wang played the Saint-Saens cello concerto at the Shanghai Music Hall.
In 1985, Wang went to the United States and studied with renowned cellist Aldo Parisot at the Yale School of Music.
With "Salute to Wang Jian," the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra started with a special welcome with 11 cellists in its cello section performing Heitor Villa-Lobos' "The Bachianas Brasileiras No. 1." It is among the composer's most noted works and among the first major works written for a cello ensemble.
Wang joined in the second piece "Hymnus for 12 Cellos," written by German composer and cellist Julius Klengel. A 1972 radio production of the piece with Berlin Philharmonic musicians led to the formation of the famed 12 Cellists of the Berlin Philharmonic.
The concert also featured Haydn's "Cello Concerto No. 1 in C major" and Dvorak's "Cello Concerto in B minor." The two pieces were "a beauty of contrast," Wang said.
"Dvorak's piece is very romantic with a rich color, while Haydn's piece more classic," he explained.
"I view this concert as a gift for me from the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, and a gift from me for the Shanghai audience."
The Shanghai Symphony Orchestra's first Europe tour in 1992 featured Wang, then 24, as a soloist.
Wang's collaboration with the local symphony orchestra started at age 12 and continued for decades.
He was featured in the orchestra's first European tour in 1992. A year later in 1993, Wang finished his studies in the US and held his first concert back home, also with the orchestra.
On his latest return to Shanghai, Wand has found more potential for cello music and has received increasingly more invitations for cello recitals.
"I hope to bring more great cello pieces that were previously unheard of here," he said.
