2019 was a busy year for me. I played Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 13 with Casa Loma Symphony in Toronto with Paolo Busato, and the late Kerry Stratton was in attendance; five days later, I flew to my native Korea to play Robert Schumann’s Kinderszenen and Clara Schumann’s Piano Trio with members of Korean Soloists (Myung-Hye Kwon and Jaesung Lim).
In May 2019, I played an interesting show with Korean pop artist Horan in Seoul. We collaborated on a repertoire that included anything from Bizet and Piaf to a traditional English ballad and Horan’s own songs; I played a solo set of Chopin, Poulenc, Kapustin, and Ravel.
Other concerts included recital engagements Vancouver and Toronto, and world-premiere of Walter Buczynski’s piano sonatas. I played many other chamber music series, including the Korean-Canadian Chamber Concerts, Music Friends in Vancouver, and the Arts and Letters Club recital.
My solo concerts in 2020 were to include a solo appearance with Georgian Bay Symphony, as well as other solo and chamber concert engagements in Seoul, Vancouver, and Toronto. As everyone now knows, the Covid-19 crisis made it impossible. But I could still play and communicate through online concerts and broadcasts arranged by organizations such as Georgian Bay Symphony and Centric MusicFest.
During the lockdown, I concentrated on J. S. Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier Book I. Now the whole set is prepared and memorized. I look forward to playing this monumental and beautiful work for a live audience – let us all stay safe and healthy until then.
