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Famous concert pianist I grew up with...

Flint

Flint

Prodigal Son
Superstar
Jeremy Denk was in my graduating class in high school, even though he was several years younger than me. He and I would play musical games on all the kids in band and orchestra, because we could... we loved the inside joke and he, being a child in high school, needed friends like me to fit in a little. We had a ton of fun. I always felt sorry for him.

Well, his child genius music star upbringing sent him off to some prestigious conservatory and I really hadn't heard about him much since then. The last I heard a few years ago was his job accompanying some really famous violinist on recordings and tours, which is a huge deal for any educated musician.

Now I've discovered he is performing here in Austin as the headline act this coming February and on the promotional site for the performance there's this amazing video of him playing Ives. I LOVE IVES!!! Despite the music being incredibly complex (and occassionally off-kilter), his performance makes even the most dissonate note sound palpable. I am very impressed with this guy.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtrpRHouVXs[/youtube]

(I cannot make videos embed anymore)
 
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtrpRHouVXs[/youtube]


Ahhh... there it is!!!
 
In this video it appears Jeremy is having some sort of mental breakdown, but if you try to follow the time signature of what he is playing, I can understand the facial expressions. Hell, I cannot imagine even learning that piece of music.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIY1tKU15kA[/youtube]
 
Thanks, Flint. Wow, he's really good! I'm familiar with the Ives Concord sonata - not that I can play it... The Ligeti is very interesting. Yes it certainly takes a particular talent to play these modern works, totally different from playing Beethoven or Liszt; not that it's necessarily harder technically, but remembering all those notes and figuring out how to express the music is a challenge. I can't do it with that type of music.
 
WOW, there is some serious right brain/ left brain stuff going on in that second video. Holy moly, I can't imagine being able to do something that complicated.
 
I admit that I don't get that music. The guy has way more musical talent in one fingernail than I have in my entire (over-sized) body but I guess I'm not sophisticated enough to understand it and thus can't enjoy it.
 
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