Emily-Jane Luo in Review
Emily-Jane Luo, piano
Merkin Concert Hall, Kaufman Center, New York, NY
September 19, 2021
For me, youth has always equated to bravery: bravery in selecting the most daunting repertoire, bravery in playing one of the first indoor solo recitals since the pandemic, bravery in billing it as one’s New York debut. As to the repertoire point, I’m quite on board with it, since if the pupil is apt, it is wise to familiarize neural connections with issues of speed, accuracy, and volume as early as possible.
Fifteen-year-old Emily-Jane Luo is no longer technically a child prodigy, though her early training and appearances qualify as such. She began piano studies at an early age, and has already been making the rounds of competitions, and had her orchestral concerto debut. Normally, I’m a bit leery of prodigies, only because I fear they may be over-developing one aspect of themselves at the expense of a holistic sense of self. I needn’t fear for Ms. Luo, for she also excels in science, writing, taekwondo, and French.
Her recital was exciting throughout, with fiery bravura technique, thoughtful phrasing, lots of temperament, and even an old-fashioned sense of the “big line,” which doesn’t get caught up in details but propels and keeps things together. She chose a program of fearsome difficulty that would make a colleague of four times her age sweat with anxiety.
Ms. Luo possesses that rare quality, an individualism, when the mass of other young pianists are striving to fit in and get “all the notes right.”
She will have time to develop more subtlety and control, but for now . . . wow! This was not careful, cookie-cutter playing. Tempi were sometimes pushed to the extreme (ah, youth!); however, a few seconds later, in a reflective passage, she had that rare ability to make time stop with her generous breathing. I, for one, am glad she wasn’t careful; had she played every single note correctly, I might have thought I was witnessing some supernatural evil contract with the devil.
As far as a debut recital is concerned, the program was short on the Classical period (Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and the like) and some twentieth century music (or twenty-first!) more adventurous than Rachmaninoff. I suspect she might be a great Prokofiev or Bartók pianist. It was also just an hour long (perhaps logistics of the hall), but what an hour!
This was also my first (COVID-19 “re-opening”) live indoor concert, and every melting phrase meant so much to me. Those who read my reviews regularly know how I value a fine set of program notes, which was provided here, though their author was uncredited (Ms. Luo?). Even the words to the Schubert Lieder transcribed by Liszt, so important to Liszt that he had them put in the published score, were printed.
Ms. Luo’s handling of the three Schubert songs (Ständchen, Gretchen am Spinnrade, Erlkönig) was divine. I’m going to be heretical here and say, one didn’t really miss the singer, her rendering was so complete, with great voicing and a “linguistic” musical phrase. Ms. Luo’s Ständchen was so seductive it would have made any lover hop out the bedroom window to join the beloved in the garden. The mad dash of the galloping horse in Erlkönig was thrilling. I’m glad these transcriptions are coming back to the recital stage more often. Once seen as nothing but show-off vehicles, they are in fact so much more, but only in the right hands.
Ms. Luo’s Bach C minor Partita I took some exception to, on two points: it was a shame to have the piece amputated of its dance movements (she played only the opening Sinfonia), and either she hasn’t been taught, or has made a deliberate decision not, to change the sixteenth notes in the French overture first part to thirty-second notes, which they should be. The second and especially the third sections of the Sinfonia were played too quickly, robbing them of depth. But, as one is playing on a nine-foot Steinway, perhaps Richard Taruskin is right about the illusion of authenticity.
She followed this immediately with two of Rachmaninoff’s sublime Etudes-Tableaux, one from Op. 33, G minor, and one from Op. 39, the famous E-flat minor. Both were played with command, poignancy, and grandeur: every opportunity was taken. Ms. Luo speaks this language quite naturally.
Then came the “center of gravity”: both books of Brahms’s Variations on a Theme of Paganini, Op. 35. This fiendish torture-chamber of pianistic difficulties showed off Ms. Luo’s many strengths, again particularly in the slower, more thoughtful variations, though there was great excitement in the headlong rapid ones. She knows how to vary voicing and dynamics upon the repeat of a section, a talent that is so necessary and valuable.
She favored the audience with an encore: one of Rachmaninoff’s Moments Musicaux, E Minor, Op. 16, No. 4, marked Presto, and was it ever! Ms. Luo, at this point completely unfettered, simply plunged into the maelstrom, and it was worth it.
I wish her all success in whatever she chooses to do with her music, or her other interests. Thank you, Emily-Jane.
