I don’t often try to make it to a West End lunchtime recital from the fastnesses of Canary Wharf. But I’m going to make an exception this Friday to try to get to hear MinJung Baek. The programme is an exciting one, including a piano work by Korean composer Unsuk Chin, who had a whole day devoted to her music at the Barbican last year. Plus there will be some rarely-played Clementi and some Liszt – it’s got to be worth a listen. And having heard her Brahms intermezzo, playing in the background when you visit her website, I think we’ll be in safe hands.
MinJung Baek
Programme
Muzio Clementi – Sonata in G op39 No2
UnSuk Chin – Piano Etude No 4 “Scalen”
Franz Liszt – Sonetto del Petrarca 104
Franz Liszt – Sonata in B minor S178Pianists of the World Series
1:00pm – Friday 27 January 2012
St Martin-in-the-Fields
http://www.minjungbaek.com/Lunchtime Concert
South Korean-born pianist, MinJung Baek is currently studying at Guildhall School of Music & Drama with Ronan O’Hora and Caroline Palmer. She also studies at the Accademia Pianistica Internazionale “Incontri col maestro” di Imola, Italy with Leonid Margarius. She began studying the piano at the age of four, entered her first competition at five and by eleven she had won fifty Korean national competitions. Later, she was eminent in international piano competitions in USA, UK, and Italy, where she won the 2006 Rachmaninoff Piano Competition. At the age of 10, she made her orchestral debut with Busan Philharmonic orchestra playing the Beethoven Piano Concerto No 1. Since then, she has performed extensively in USA, Italy, Spain, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Japan, Russia and the UK.
In 1999, MinJung collaborated with famous French pianist, Richard Clayderman in the ”99 Richard Clayderman et son orchestre’ Korea Tour as a competition winner.
MinJung has been the recipient of numerous awards, including, 2003 The Highest Student Award of School Honor from Seoul Arts High School, 2005 Artist Grant by NewYork Foundation of Arts, 2006 Artist Proclamation Award by Jeff Schonberg, Illinois Senator of USA and Mannes Presidential Award, 2007 Earl Wild’s Teaching Fellowship by Ivory Classic. She has been invited and played at numerous music festival including 2004 NewYork Contemporary Music Festival, 2005 NewYork Late Romanticism Festival, 2005 TCU/Cliburn Piano institute in Fortworth, 2006 Sarasota Music Festival, 2007 Samuel Barber Music festival, and in both 2006 and 2008 the Hamamatsu International Piano Academy in Japan.
