Liang Wang, preparing to meet students in Shanghai, wasn’t featured in concerts there. More Photos >
On a Tour of China, Some Musicians Feel Overlooked
By DANIEL J. WAKINSHANGHAI — The New York Philharmonic’s recently appointed principal oboist is a native of China. Its fast-rising associate conductor is too. And they collaborated in a well-received concerto performance in Hong Kong during the orchestra’s current tour in Asia.
New York Philharmonic in Asia
Overtures to North Korea; selling concerts like burgers; and other reports from Daniel J. Wakin in Shanghai.
- Go to ArtsBeat
But that was it. Despite expectations that the oboist, Liang Wang, and the conductor, Xian Zhang, would return as conquering heroes on the mainland, neither was featured in concerts in Shanghai this week nor will they be in Beijing, where the orchestra plays this weekend.
Both had expected to perform more often on the tour. Ms. Zhang said she had even cleared her schedule, canceling a performance at a China-focused festival with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and putting off appearances with the London Symphony Orchestra. “Both of us are quite surprised that it was changed to only Hong Kong,” Ms. Zhang said on Wednesday night. “But that’s all right.” She declined to speculate on why the schedule was altered.
Mr. Wang said that he had been told by the orchestra early in the season that he would have concerto appearances on the mainland. He played Strauss’s Oboe Concerto in Hong Kong on Feb. 18, with Ms. Zhang conducting. They also presented a children’s concert, and Mr. Wang’s extended family in China came to cheer him on.
“Playing the Strauss in Hong Kong was a historical event,” he said. The lack of expected appearances “feels like exactly what it is, which is being rejected by your own people.” Mr. Wang suspected that the Chinese presenters of the Philharmonic did not see him as a soloist attractive to Chinese audiences, as compared with Westerners.
Other soloists on the tour include Alisa Weilerstein, a cellist; Glenn Dicterow, the orchestra’s concertmaster; and Philip Myers, the principal horn player.
Mr. Wang said that his omission on the tour made little sense. “The Olympics are coming,” he said. “The economy is great. People more than ever have pride being Chinese. Why not cultivate it? If you’ve made it in the West, why is it? I don’t understand.”
Ms. Zhang said that listeners to a radio program she appeared on in Shanghai sent e-mail messages to the show expressing disappointment at her absence. Tan Dun, the composer, who attended a Shanghai performance on Wednesday, said it was possible that the presenters did not know that Mr. Wang “is on top.”
He added: “At this stage, China is a little slow. But not tomorrow.”
The issue of Chinese soloists touches on the larger question of how Western classical music is being presented in a country where the genre has exploded into a major force, with tens of millions of instrumental students, a regular flow of exceptionally talented musicians overseas and a thriving scene at home in China. Concert halls have sprouted, but the programming often lags.
Orchestra and concert hall officials in Beijing and Shanghai said the situation regarding Mr. Wang and Ms. Zhang was complicated.
Eric Latzky, the Philharmonic’s spokesman, said the two Shanghai concerts were part of a series devoted to great orchestras and their music directors. So the Philharmonic’s music director, Lorin Maazel, had to be featured, not Ms. Zhang. “In Beijing,” Mr. Latzky added, referring to the orchestra’s next tour stop, “we understand that at this brand-new performing arts center they wish to have the music director conduct solely, as a way of inaugurating the hall.” The National Center for the Performing Arts in Beijing opened in December.
Mr. Wang’s absence was partly a result of repertory choices. The orchestra had hoped to feature more of him on the tour, Mr. Latzky said. “But as we discussed programs and developed the concert ideas on these tours, it was also important for us to work cooperatively with the presenters and accommodate their wishes.”
Qian Shi Jin, artistic director of the Shanghai Grand Theater, said that the Philharmonic had presented several program options, but that he did not recall any of them including Mr. Wang. “The two programs have been decided by the New York Philharmonic,” he said in an interview. “So we have to accept that.” The only change he asked for was the inclusion of overtures at the beginning to accommodate latecomers, a problem with Chinese audiences, he said.
He added that he did not think of the programs from the perspective of whether to have a Chinese soloist, but what pieces to include. He also said he was happy to have Mr. Myers, the horn player, perform on Thursday (playing a Mozart concerto) because of the limited state of Chinese brass playing.
Mr. Qian, a former orchestral violinist, said that he had pushed for Chinese soloists to be included in the programs of foreign orchestras, successfully so with recent performances by the Luxembourg Philharmonic and the Radio France Philharmonic orchestras and with an appearance by the St. Petersburg Philharmonic of Russia coming in November. All three have hired Chinese soloists who fared well in international competitions for their Shanghai appearances.
Mr. Qian allowed that presenters in other cities may be slower to introduce Chinese soloists for fear they won’t sell as many tickets. But he also pointed out that Western bookers sometimes think Chinese audiences can be fooled by pickup ensembles with “pretty-sounding names,” like the Vienna Palace Orchestra or the Vienna Imperial Orchestra. “They get together and try to make some money in Shanghai,” he said.
In Beijing officials of the National Center for the Performing Arts said their goal in presenting the Philharmonic was to show its glory as an ensemble, and that while Ms. Zhang was an excellent conductor, Mr. Maazel was more prominent.
Ms. Zhang, a native of Dandong, in northeastern China,has earned excellent reviews in recent years and is taking on increasingly important guest-conducting assignments. Mr. Wang, from Qingdao, in the east, is in his second season as principal oboist, having won the job at only 26 after a remarkable run of successful auditions at other orchestras.
No comments:
Post a Comment