It is a cold Friday evening in December and the five of us are having a three hour rehearsal with the Emperor Concerto. It is a big piece, and the first rehearsal is always hard work, especially since we never played together before. Members of the other PU quartet, Tienne, Kelly and Georgia bring us welcomed short breaks when they show up to sign a poster.
Before we end the rehearsal with a run-through of the concerto, the quartet sits down with me to answer a few questions. My initial question is how they started to play their instruments, but first they will give us some basic facts.
Where were you born and what do you study at Princeton?
Ian: “I’m 21, born in Miami, still lives there. I study physics at Princeton as well as a music minor”.
Daniel: “I was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, I am 21 and studying neuroscience with a violin performance minor.”.
Jisang: “I was born in Seoul, South Korea, and I’m 19, but I live in New Jersey now. I’m studying math majors with minors in quantitative economics and statistics and machine learning”.
Elliott: “I’m from Los Angeles California, I’m 20, studying computer science with a finance minor and cello performance minor“.
I can’t resist asking them if they think AI will threaten their future careers. Not too much, they all say. It’s a tool for them to do what they do even better. “I think if I go into pure mathematics, there’s really nothing to worry about”. says Jisang. “If I go into applied, there’s definitely a little bit to worry about, but I think part of the priorities that I think you should have at Princeton is setting yourself up with the skills to harness AI as said or give yourself unique skills that can’t easily be emulated by AI”.
When it comes to knowing something about Sweden, my native country, I will have to concede that AI beats them handily, however. Jisang does knowledge IKEA, but the Swedish Fish candy is not really Swedish, and well, Daniel’s suggestion that they make nice watches is the good old funny Switzerland-Sweden mix-up. But, it ended in laughs and was a nice ice breaker if such was needed. Call it the beauty of imperfection.
As you will read, when it comes to how they started playing music, all four were guided by their mothers. So, kudos to the moms!
Ian:
“I started to play when I was three and a half. My mom would play me Mozart to calm me down which always worked, so I think my parents knew I was musically inclined.
My mom really thought that I would like classical music. And then my dad happened to have a violin that his grandfather had given him for some reason and he’d never played it. So that’s how I started.”
I
“My mom would play me Mozart to calm me down.”
“I chose the violin and she told me to try for one year. If I didn’t like it I could quit“
Daniel:
I started playing the violin when I was ten but I had played the piano for five years by then, My mom wanted me to play an instrument that was more collaborative because piano is quite solo focused.
She brought me to a chamber music concert and honestly, I wasn’t very interested
in any of the instruments. But she told me to choose one instrument. I chose the violin and she told me to try for one year. If I didn’t like it I could quit but… I really liked it.
Jisang:
I started viola when I was twelve, but I played the violin at age six. I started violin because my mom started playing the violin when she was pregnant with me, she thought it was really fun, and so she kind of passed it on to me.
So, she started as an adult?
Yes.
That’s a challenge.
Yeah. I think she was being taught by someone who lived in our building.
And then I started viola because my teacher taught both violin and viola and she said I was tall and so I should switch.
I
I
“I started violin because my mom started playing the violin when she was pregnant with me.”
My mom just really liked string instruments in general. She was like, “Oh, why not try the cello?”
Elliott:
“I started playing piano when I was six and cello when I was seven. I think the main reason is because my older sister plays violin.
My mom just really liked string instruments in general. She was like, “Oh, why not try the cello?” And I really liked it because of its dark darker sound, it just really stuck with me”.
We talk about the Emperor Concerto, and what is so special with the work. “It’s a solo concerto, so there are no expectations of anything groundbreaking and new. But there are so many twists and turns that you really wouldn’t expect in the music yet while still staying in a quite conventional form”, says Ian.
As so often with this concerto, focus turns on the slow movement. It turns out that Daniel’s mother played that movement to him as a child. “Growing up my mom played it all the time. I think the second movement is probably her favorite piece of music like, maybe ever. I think I’ve always just associate this piece with my mom”
From the second movement of the Emperor Concerto with NOVO Quartet, in the same arrangement we will hear on January 20:
Elliott says that his teacher used the slow movement as an example of a miracle being made out of something very simple, a few notes of a scale. Jisang thinks that the Emperor reminds us of how Beethoven expanded musical forms and expression to the brink of the romantic era.
“Keeping my musical
skill up is one of the most important things to me”
I ask them how they manage practicing their instruments with the immense pressure that comes with being a student at Princeton. Ian says he decided to always practice, every day, no matter what is around him. and the other stuff always finds a way to get done somehow.
What they all say is that music, and playing, is therapeutic. Like Elliott says, the Princeton experience makes him appreciate music even more.
“Even though I am super busy, spending time to practice, I never regret it, not least because I feel so much better afterwards”, Daniel says. Elliott says that he likes to practice, no studies could take him away from the cello.
“Music has given me the best moments of my life.“
And with that, I calmly contend that the future is bright. If you don’t believe me, or feel it because of all the negative noise… come to the concert on January 20.
Princeton Chamber Music Series 