Anne-Sophie Mutter is a special figure in the world of classical music. A child prodigy on the violin, she was taken up by Herbert von Karajan who conducted her in a performance with his Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra when she was only 13. She subsequently went on to enjoy an international career, recording numerous works and performing worldwide. Her current series of Taiwan concerts, plus a master class, is part of a short Asian tour — she will go from here to Shanghai, and then on to Japan.
In Taiwan, Mutter will play Brahms’ three violin sonatas (with Lambert Orkis, piano) in Taipei tonight, and in Kaohsiung tomorrow night. She will then play Dvorak’s Violin Concerto in A Minor with the National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra under Michael Francis in Taichung on Sunday and in Taipei on Wednesday. In addition she will give a violin master class on Tuesday.
For some reason, although the term “piano sonata” always means a work for solo piano, “violin sonata” generally means a work for violin and piano. Brahms wrote three such sonatas (there was another, written in his youth, that he destroyed). The first two of them are in three movements, the third in four. This final sonata is the most taxing and complex of the three.
Orkis is a frequent collaborator of Mutter’s, and earlier often accompanied the late cellist Mstislav Rostropovich. Mutter and Orkis’ new CD of the three Brahms sonatas was released last month by Deutsche Grammophon. They can be seen discussing this music on Mutter’s official Web site (www.anne-sophie-mutter.com).
Mutter has never recorded Dvorak’s Violin Concerto in A Minor. Who knows, perhaps her playing it in Taiwan will be a prelude to an eventual recording release. The work, though less popular than Dvorak’s Cello Concerto in B Minor, is well-known, and was given a stellar rendition by Chinese violinist Siqing Lu (呂思清) in Taipei in October 2006 with the Evergreen Symphony Orchestra.
Sept.16 to Sept. 22 The “anti-communist train” with then-president Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) face plastered on the engine puffed along the “sugar railway” (糖業鐵路) in May 1955, drawing enthusiastic crowds at 103 stops covering nearly 1,200km. An estimated 1.58 million spectators were treated to propaganda films, plays and received free sugar products. By this time, the state-run Taiwan Sugar Corporation (台糖, Taisugar) had managed to connect the previously separate east-west lines established by Japanese-era sugar factories, allowing the anti-communist train to travel easily from Taichung to Pingtung’s Donggang Township (東港). Last Sunday’s feature (Taiwan in Time: The sugar express) covered the inauguration of the
The corruption cases surrounding former Taipei Mayor and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) head Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) are just one item in the endless cycle of noise and fuss obscuring Taiwan’s deep and urgent structural and social problems. Even the case itself, as James Baron observed in an excellent piece at the Diplomat last week, is only one manifestation of the greater problem of deep-rooted corruption in land development. Last week the government announced a program to permit 25,000 foreign university students, primarily from the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia, to work in Taiwan after graduation for 2-4 years. That number is a
This year’s Michelin Gourmand Bib sported 16 new entries in the 126-strong Taiwan directory. The fight for the best braised pork rice and the crispiest scallion pancake painstakingly continued, but what stood out in the lineup this year? Pang Taqueria (胖塔可利亞); Taiwan’s first Michelin-recommended Mexican restaurant. Chef Charles Chen (陳治宇) is a self-confessed Americophile, earning his chef whites at a fine-dining Latin-American fusion restaurant. But what makes this Xinyi (信義) spot stand head and shoulders above Taipei’s existing Mexican offerings? The authenticity. The produce. The care. AUTHENTIC EATS In my time on the island, I have caved too many times to
In a stark demonstration of how award-winning breakthroughs can come from the most unlikely directions, researchers have won an Ig Nobel prize for discovering that mammals can breathe through their anuses. After a series of tests on mice, rats and pigs, Japanese scientists found the animals absorb oxygen delivered through the rectum, work that underpins a clinical trial to see whether the procedure can treat respiratory failure. The team is among 10 recognized in this year’s Ig Nobel awards (see below for more), the irreverent accolades given for achievements that “first make people laugh, and then make them think.” They are not