Unfortunately due to the current situation with COVID-19, several of Yekwon’s upcoming performances have had to be cancelled:
Four Seasons Arts – 14 March 2020
Steinway Prize Winner Concert – 21 March 2020
Danish Radio Symphony – 26 & 27 March 2020
Tongyeong International Music Festival – 30 March 2020
Morningside College Recital Series – 5 April 2020
Hopefully there will be opportunities for these concerts to be rescheduled. Please refer to the Schedule page for any updates.
San Francisco Classical Voice
Superstar Pianist Yekwon Sunwoo Tackles Prokofiev for SF Ballet
By Claudia Bauer
Claudia Bauer: “How can you play this music, which seems to require so much concentration, and also pay attention to what Martin asks you to do to modulate for the dancers onstage — especially given that there will probably be a few different casts, and you may have to modulate differently for each cast and performance?”
Yekwon Sunwoo: “The challenging part is the rehearsal with the dancers — how to change the tempo, and especially in this one — in the first movement — there’s a quite long cadenza for solo piano. For that, I’m guessing I will have to change a lot of, not necessarily the dynamics, but the tempo and some of the climactic points — how much time I’ll take getting into it, or how much force I will push into it. It will be fun. I like being more flexible. Being flexible helps any artist to be refreshed. It opens up a lot more layers. But definitely technically, it’s very, very, very challenging.”
Read the full interview here.
Green Valley News
Symphony Review: TSO opens new season of Beethoven
By Donald J. Behnke
The highlight of the afternoon was clearly the Beethoven 3rd Piano Concerto with Yekwon Sunwoo as soloist. A native of Korea, this 30-year-old First Place Winner of the 2017 Van Cliburn competition put forth a stellar performance befitting his now-commanding position in the musical world.
His technique is incomparable, including rarely heard, soothingly soft passages such as the unusually slow and languid 2nd movement, as well as Macy’s Fourth of July fireworks in the incredible runs and arpeggios of the fortes. The audience was mesmerized, as was this reviewer. It was truly a Gold Medal performance.
Read the full review here.
Yonhap News Agency
Award-winning pianist Sunwoo Yekwon dreams of conveying true emotions
By Kim Boram
“About three or four years ago, something different came into my mind,” he said. “I started to look for contests that guarantee their winners musical activities as performers. I wanted to grab such opportunities.”
His aim was achieved by winning the gold medal at the Van Cliburn competition in 2017, which gave him a chance to perform world tour concerts and recitals for three years as well as to win substantial cash prizes.
He was the first South Korean pianist to win the Texas-based quadrennial contest, named after renowned U.S. pianist Van Cliburn and first held in 1962, and became one of the most sought-after pianists in Korea.
“Since I first started to learn piano when I was eight years old, I’ve just wanted to read the music and play the piano well,” he said. “And as time went by, I’m trying to focus on the sound itself and catch emotions that the music has and seek ways to convey the feeling through my play.”
He said he loves the moment when the pianist and the audience share the same feeling and emotion during a performance. He felt that very state at his latest recital in Guri, east of Seoul, on Sunday.
“The atmosphere or vibe at a hall differs every time I perform. At the Guri performance, in particular, it helped me focus more on music and playing,” the pianist said. “The audience was well absorbed in music, and I was too. That was a rare experience.”
Read the full interview here.
The Korea Times
Sunwoo Yekwon performs for his mentoring project for young Korean pianists
By Anna J. Park
Pianist Sunwoo Yekwon, one of the most sought-after Korean pianists on the international stage, is slated to perform a special concert at Myeongdong Cathedral in central Seoul on Aug. 26.
The winner of the 15th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in 2017, the most prestigious piano competition in North America, will present Schubert’s “4 Impromptus, D 935” and Chopin’s “24 Preludes, Op. 28” during the 75-minute concert, without intermission.
It is rare that the Myeongdong Cathedral, the church for the Archdiocese of Seoul, has given the green light for artists to perform there. But Sunwoo’s special concert is part of a joint social mentoring project in which he is collaborating with the Catholic Church to give emerging classical musicians scholarships and opportunities to perform.
As Artistic Director of the “Korean Young Pianist Series,” Sunwoo, 30, handpicked seven young pianists ― all recent award winners ― including Lim Ju-hee and Lee Hyuk, both 19, offering his mentorship and a stage for performance.
Sunwoo’s performance on Aug. 26 will open the concert series. It will be followed by solo recitals by the gifted seven up-and-coming pianists at Myeongdong Cathedral’s Familia Chapel from September to next March. All admission ticket profits from Sunwoo’s August concert will be donated for scholarships for the seven pianists.
Read the full article here.
The Korea Times
Korean Symphony Orchestra’s ‘Classic Hero’ concerts feature pianist Sunwoo Ye-kwon and violinist Lim Ji-young
By Anna J. Park
The Korean Symphony Orchestra presents its new concert series “Classic Hero” for audiences this summer. The orchestra tapped two internationally-rising Korean classical stars, pianist Sunwoo Ye-kwon and violinist Lim Ji-young, to play with the orchestra for each concert, slated to perform on July 19 and August 1, respectively.
What the two Korean artists have in common is that they both became the first Korean winners of prestigious international competitions; Pianist Sunwoo won the 2017 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, among many of his winning records including the Sendai International Music Competition in 2013 and International German Piano Award in 2015. Violinist Lim also became the first ― and only ― Korean ever to win the Queen Elisabeth Competition in 2015. Both have very active globe-trotting concert schedules, and the two young performers are expected to dazzle Korean audiences with their stellar talent at the concert series.
On July 19, Sunwoo will present Prokofiev’s “Piano Concerto No. 3 in C major” with the Korean Symphony Orchestra at 8 p.m. at the Concert Hall in Seoul Arts Center. Following Sunwoo’s performance, the orchestra will play another Russian composer Scriabin’s “Symphony No. 3 in C minor,” titled “The Divine Poem,” under the baton of conductor Chung Chi-yong.
Read the full article here.
The Korea Herald
Pianist Sunwoo Yekwon to pay homage to Schumann with ‘My Clara’ tour
By Im Eun-byel
Pianist Sunwoo Yekwon is embarking on a series of recitals in 10 cities.
Titled “My Clara,” the nationwide tour begins Thursday and continues through June 1. The program, drawn up by the pianist himself, includes Clara Schumann’s Notturno in F Major, Robert Schumann’s Fantasie in C Major and Johannes Brahms’ Piano Sonata No. 3 in F Minor.
“Lately, I have been feeling more connected to the works of the Schumanns and Brahms,” the 29-year-old pianist said during a press conference Monday at the culture complex Ode Port in southern Seoul.
“The three artists were close and influenced each other, creating indescribably good works — something to be grateful for,” he said, referring to the close friendship between the couple and Brahms.
According to the pianist, the tour’s title reflects his affection for Clara Schumann, with the 200th anniversary of her birth being marked this year.
“Clara Schumann was a type of a person with many characteristics (thoughts) in her head. I am not one to be easily swayed, but musicians have to live with a lot of emotions,” he said.
Read the full article here.
The Washington Post
Korean pianist shows there is musical life beyond winning competitions
By Charles T. Downey
Music competitions, for all their negative qualities, can launch extraordinary careers. Yekwon Sunwoo is one example, remembered in Washington for his first prize at the final William Kapell International Piano Competition in 2012. On the heels of winning the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition last year, the Korean pianist played an outstanding recital Wednesday at the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater, presented by Washington Performing Arts.
Nothing about Sunwoo’s program smacked of the showpiece territory exemplified by music competitions. The opening work, Percy Grainger’s “Ramble on the Last Love Duet From ‘Der Rosenkavalier,’ ” was delightfully weird, humid with triple nostalgia — of Strauss for a lost Vienna, of Grainger for his friendship with Strauss and for his recently deceased mother. Sunwoo gave the piece orchestral scope, not necessarily in volume, but in variety of color, using all three pedals to create sculpted sound worlds that caught the opera’s vast but intimate scale.
Further highlights of delicacy and elegance abounded in Schubert’s Four Impromptus, D. 935. Well-applied rubato, both speeding up and slowing down, gave each piece a different romantic sheen, mercurial in No. 1, pallid in No. 2. Each variation in No. 3 had a character defined by degrees of touch at the keyboard, especially the turbulent minor variation and the gossamer right hand of the final one. The more daunting challenges of the last Impromptu all came together with exquisite refinement, including parallel thirds, double-hand scales and trills.
Read the full review here.
Princeton’s Town Topics
“Old Havana” Comes to Princeton as Cuba’s National Symphony Orchestra Tours the U.S.
By Nancy Plum
Pérez Mesa brought the orchestra together with a dynamic and technically brilliant piano soloist to perform Edvard Grieg’s Piano Concerto in A Minor, featuring soloist Yekwon Sunwoo. A 2017 Gold Medalist of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, Sunwoo showed not only virtuosic abilities but also great sensitivity and the ability to change the mood of the music with a single note. He demonstrated a very light touch when needed, with a bit of humor in more delicate cadences. Sunwoo played the first movement cadenza as if it were a meditation for himself, with especially thoughtful descending and cascading passages and fierce octaves. He played the third movement’s technical fireworks with a bit of sauciness, bringing out the Gypsy dance effect.
The News-Gazette
Brilliant Piano Recital
By John Frayne
On March 14, pianist Yekwon Sunwoo, who won the Van Cliburn International Competiton Gold Medal, came to the Foellinger Great hall, and demonstrated marvelous pianistic skills.
Clearly a major talent, Sunwoo played with the most delicate sensitivity and also with enormous power and dazzling velocity when the music demanded those skills.
Sunwoo is a poet of the keyboard, with obvious Romantic sensibilities…
Sunwoo is the first Korean to win Van Cliburn gold, and after the recital, the line of Sunwoo fans, eager to meet him, stretched far across the Krannert lobby.
Are comparisons with Lang Lang in order?
Time will tell.
Read the full review here.