Young pianist plays ‘amazingly well’ in Aikins win

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This article was published 17/03/2020 (2393 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Winnipeg Music Festival’s annual Aikins Memorial Trophy competition saved the best for last Saturday night, as pianist Fan-En Chiang, 21, garnered the prestigious prize after taking the stage as the 16th and final performer of the night.

“I felt very surprised hearing my name,” the soft-spoken pianist said immediately upon hearing he had been given the nod for his dazzling interpretation of Ravel’s Scarbo by this year’s panel of four adjudicators: Jenny Regehr, Viktoriia Grynenko, James Hickerson and Jean-Philippe Tanguay.

The Aikins Memorial Trophy, named after James Aikins, Manitoba’s ninth lieutenant governor (1916-26), has been awarded since 1930 for most outstanding performance in an instrumentalist competition.

Chiang’s Aikins prize package includes the Ann Lugsdin Memorial Bursary, as well as guest appearances during the Young Artists Program by Virtuosi Concerts and at the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s annual spring showcase. Chiang also received the John Melnyk Trophy and bursary and the Royal Conservatory of Music Alumni Association Winnipeg Chapter Trophy and scholarship.

The 135-minute evening — held at the Winnipeg Art Gallery and attended by about 85 listeners — capped off a total of five WMF classes Chiang performed in throughout last week at the 102-year-old festival. The omnipresent coronavirus made its presence known, with WMF executive director Joanne Mercier and local musician Claudette Caron scrubbing down the piano keyboard with disinfectant after each performance.

Also unusual was seeing many prominent Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra principal players, including concertmaster Gwen Hoebig, in the house on a Saturday night, after all WSO concerts for the rest of March, including last weekend’s three Pops shows, were cancelled last Friday.

Adjudicator Regehr, who heard the pianist peform throughout the week, as well as during previous years, was enthusiastic about his performance of the final movement from Ravel’s Gaspard de la nuit piano suite (1908). “It had all the components. It has all the technical demands, all of the imagination, and all of the structural ideas. Everything was just there and Fan-En plays it so amazingly well at such a young age,” she says. “Fan-En is a very, very mature player and was strong even when he was younger. He’s been coming up for a long time.”

His chosen piece is widely regarded as one of the most fiendishly difficult works in the entire solo piano repertoire, filled with treacherous details and technical tricks in capturing the spirit of the “little demon goblin.” Chiang, who began working on the roughly nine-minute piece last August, travelled to Vancouver to further hone his performance with former Winnipeg pianist Scott Meek and his Taiwanese-born pianist wife, Clare Yuan — family friends of his mother and father, Chiang Chian (Frank) Cheng, still residing in China.

“I want the audience to be captivated by my playing, and hear all the harmonic intricacies in the Ravel, because it’s not a very common piece for the average listener,” Fan-En says. “I want them to feel a sense of excitement. I want to show them something fun.”

Currently in his second year of composition studies — piano is done “on the side” — at the University of Manitoba Desautels Faculty of Music, the Taiwanese-born artist moved to Winnipeg with his mother, Yi-Tzu (Kiki) Huang and his double bass-playing brother, Meng Ching (Ginny) Chiang, 20, in 2008. He embarked on piano lessons first with local teacher Caron Whitlaw-Hiebert, before eventually moving to his current instructor, Darryl Friesen, in June 2019.

Chiang says he enjoys playing piano and composing his own music equally — packing in a solid three or four hours of practice per day, with composing usually taking place late at night when his creative juices begin to flow. He has written extensively for the piano and his other instrument, the clarinet, and loves to explore more experimental, electro-acoustic driven works.

The Vincent Massey Collegiate graduate, who completed his Associate of Conservatory Canada in Music (ACCM) diploma while in Grade 12, began studying chemistry at the U of M’s Faculty of Science before ultimately following his heart and switching to full-time music.

Although he is still defining his career goals, Chiang is adamant that music — including perhaps composing soundtracks for the video games he adores — will figure prominently in his future; he is planning to pursue graduate studies.

His musical heroes include 2013 Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer Caroline Shaw and acclaimed film/video/TV soundtrack composer Jeremy Soule, hailed as the “John Williams of video game music.”

When asked what inspires him as an artist, the musician grows thoughtful.

“I’m very interested in how sound will affect a person’s emotions, or even just their attentive listening,” he responds. “Music will often make me cry, or move me. That’s what inspires me to perform, and to compose music. It’s something that I’m very passionate about, and I want to make music so others also feel that in the same way.”

Two runners-up were also named for this year’s Aikins Memorial Trophy: pianist Ari Hooker and violinist River Sawchyn; the latter was also presented with this year’s Victor Feldbrill Trophy and Winnipeg Bach Festival Trophy.

Owing to public health concerns surrounding COVID-19, the 2020 Choral Excellence and Gala Finale concerts scheduled for Wednesday, March 18, and Sunday, March 22, respectively, have been postponed until further notice. Check the WMF website for further updates: www.winnipegmusicfestival.org.

holly.harris@shaw.ca