| Jazz vocalist Nah Youn-sun, from left, violinist Chung Kyung-wha and cellist Chung Myung-wha attend a press conference at the Grand Ambassador Seoul, Wednesday. The two Chung sisters are the artistic directors of the upcoming PyeongChang Winter Music Festival. / Yonhap |
By Kwon Ji-youn
Violinist Chung Kyung-wha will try her hand at jazz at the PyeongChang Winter Music Festival next month.
Chung, one of the festival's artistic directors, will collaborate with jazz vocalist Nah Youn-sun at the event in the small resort town of PyeongChang in Gangwon Province from Feb. 25 to 28.
One of the two pieces they will perform has been composed specially for Chung by Swedish jazz guitarist Ulf Wakenius.
"I have always loved jazz, but this will be my first time performing a jazz piece," Chung said at a press event, Wednesday. "There is a lot of pressure, but I have faith in Nah, and I'm sure it will be a great learning experience."
The PyeongChang Winter Music Festival, presented by the Great Mountains Music Festival and School (GMMFS), will add jazz, klezmer (a musical tradition of the Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe) and tango to the event that previously had been focused entirely on classical music.
Both festivals are designed to promote the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Games.
"The Olympic Games are not all about sports," said cellist Chung Myung-wha, elder sister of the violinist and fellow artistic director of the festival. "The Olympics give the host country a chance to introduce to the world its culture and way of life."
Chung Myung-wha, who was a juror at last year's Tchaikovsky Competition, said she was encouraged by conversations with the competition's director Maestro Valery Gergiev to build the first PyeongChang Winter Music Festival around a number of young artists whose works moved her during her time in Moscow.
"We are trying something new at the inaugural PyeongChang Winter Music Festival when we gather in late February," the two sisters agreed. "We are continuing the important tradition of classical music that has marked the GMMFS in summers for more than a decade, but our classical offerings are taking a turn as we celebrate the youthful inspiration of recent laureates of the Tchaikovsky International Piano, Violin, Cello and Vocal Competitions in Moscow from early in the summer of 2015."
Nah will grace the opening night of the festival on Feb. 25 -- a "natural choice for the festival's inaugural ceremony," according to the younger Chung. Others in the artist lineup include Romanian cellist Andrei Ionita, French pianist Lucas Debargue, Mongolian baritone Ariunbataar Ganbataar, Korean violinist Clara-Jumi Kang and Korean cellist Kang Seung-min. They will take part in two marathon concerts, one in a chamber recital format on Feb. 26 and one with the Korean Symphony Orchestra on Feb. 27.
Gold medal-winning cellist Ionita will perform the Tchaikovsky Trio with fellow violinist Kang and French pianist Debargue. He will be featured again with Debargue on the Schubert Arpeggione Sonata. Debargue will play solo pieces by Chopin and Ravel. Mongolian baritone Ariunbataar Ganbataar will sing a series of arias, and Tchaikovsky finalist Kang Seung-min will perform the Tchaikovsky Variations on a Rococo Theme.
German clarinetist David Orlowsky will introduce local audiences to klezmer and his updated approach to the Jewish tradition on Feb. 26, and Dutch bandoneonist Carel Kraayenhof will offer a unique take on tango music on Feb. 27.
"We have put together a program that targets not only classical music fans, but also skiers, snowboarders and tourists who happen to be in town," said the older Chung. "But it is true that to put this festival on the international map, we are going to need more financial backing."