BEIJING -- As far as millions of fans are concerned, the true highlight of the Beijing Olympics won't be the athletes performing from around the world -- it will be classical pianist Lang Lang's performance at Friday's Opening Ceremony.
Sitting at his red Steinway piano in his trademark Versace jacket and plain T-shirt, the 26-year-old commands as much affection and esteem as basketball legend Yao Ming and hurdler Liu Xiang among the Chinese.
His innate feel for popular culture, with daring references to kung fu and videogames peppering his discussions of the great composers, has made classical music accessible in China in a fundamental way. He has been filmed playing Chopin using an orange.
"I play piano like a multimedia website. You have the pictures, you have the scores, also you have the harmonies, it's like you're playing with computers, but obviously with heart," Lang said last year.
This message certainly works with China's 30 million piano students and his legions of female fans.
He suffers none of the inherent shyness that plagues the country's big names when they work abroad.
This year he has dueled pianos with Herbie Hancock at the Grammys and worked with Adidas to make a training shoe that has his name written in Chinese on the side.
Part of his confidence is due to his excellent English but a lot is down to his vivacious personality.
He is a model for all Chinese performers wishing to make it abroad.
"I just love to perform, I love the light, I love the time when I'm on stage, and I feel comfortable. I feel probably better than I do at home," he said.
His playing style is unquestionably odd. Imagine Jerry Lee Lewis playing Rachmaninov, a kind of punk version of famous classical pianist Daniel Barenboim.
His technical skills have won plaudits from the great names of classical music, including his mentor Barenboim, whom he visits for masterclasses every year in Berlin.
Lang, who hails from the north-eastern city of Shenyang, a steel town famous for building tanks and trains, started playing the piano at age 3 after being inspired by an unlikely musical star.
"When I was 2 years old I was watching 'Tom and Jerry' and the cat was playing Liszt. Tom was my first teacher," he said.
Age 5, he won the main Shenyang piano competition and gave his first public recital.
At 9 he entered Beijing's prestigious Central Music Conservatory where he dazzled his teachers, and by 13 he was playing Chopin's Etudes at the Beijing Concert Hall.
A single child of the one-child policy era, his parents suffered under the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). Lang's father, Lang Guoren, played the Chinese two-stringed violin known as the erhu and was head of the local traditional orchestra, but the reforms meant he became a police officer. Lang's mother, Zhou Xiulan, a former dancer and singer, became a telephone operator.
Lang's father was the textbook driving force, putting unbearable pressure on his son at times to be the best in the world, according to Lang's autobiography. Success meant a way out of dire poverty in Shenyang.
It paid off when Lang left China with his parents age 15, after he won a place at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.
He got his first big break internationally age 17, when he performed Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1 with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
He was the first Chinese pianist to be engaged by the Berlin Philharmonic, performing with the British conductor Simon Rattle, as well as the Vienna Philharmonic and all the leading U.S. orchestras.
YouTube footage shows Lang playing a duet with his father at Carnegie Hall, the elder Lang playing the erhu.
Not everyone is a fan -- Anthony Tommasini, chief music critic of the New York Times, described his playing as "incoherent" and "hammy" although he has been more positive of late.
Lang won great domestic plaudits for his work to help the victims of the Sichuan earthquake in May, and he will auction a red Steinway to raise money for that cause.
The Opening Ceremony is being orchestrated by helmer Zhang Yimou, whose previous public performances in opera can lead us to expect a lot of red and emotion.
Lang will be a central feature in the ceremony. It's a fair bet that he might play the Yellow River Concerto, a huge hit with local audiences.
Do not expect understatement.
© Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
There is a problem with the comment system, or you do not have javascript enabled.
 |
Variety Asia RSS
Kaiju Shakedown RSS