The Young Virtuosi: dazzling competition winners on tour

Violinist Yeyeong Jenny Jin and pianist Jeonghwan Kim performed at St Andrews on the Terrace in Wellington on an 11-concert tour for Chamber Music NZ 

Photo credit: Jeremy Brick - Michael Hill International Violin Competition

Winners of the prestigious New Zealand-based Michael Hill International Violin Competition (MHIVC) receive not only a valuable cash prize but a “Winners Tour” presented in partnership with Chamber Music NZ and the Auckland Philharmonia, plus other benefits including a recording contract.

Yeyeong Jenny Jin, winner of the 2023 Competition, is currently completing a 12 centre New Zealand tour, to be followed shortly by concerts in Sydney and Melbourne. Presented by Chamber Music NZ as “The Young Virtuosi”, the tour celebrates not only her significant competition win but that of pianist Jeonghwan Kim, winner of the 2023 Sydney International Piano Competition.   

Both musicians have been prodigies since childhood. Jin, now just 21, began playing the violin at the age of two, entering the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia aged 9 and now studying with Itzhak Perlman and Li Lin at The Juilliard School. Kim, currently Berlin-based, at the Hochschule fűr Musik Hanns Eisler, was six when he began piano lessons, and the 24-year old has won numerous competition prizes, and invitations to perform in major European concert halls.

Their tour programme has been curated around a celebration of virtuosity, works chosen to show off the impressive skills of these dazzling young musicians. Of course, international success in music requires much more than outstanding technical accomplishments. The Belgian violinist-composer Eugéne-Auguste Ysaÿe, whose music is included in their programme, suggested that a musician must be “a thinker, a poet, a human being, must have known hope, love, passion and despair, must have run the gamut of the emotions in order to express them all in their playing."

Giuseppe Tartini’s famous “Devil’s Trill” Sonata opened the programme. It’s a vehicle for the violinist, with the pianist providing a simple accompaniment from what was originally a figured bass. Jin used a wide range of colour and dynamics in the singing melodic lines and a rich, complex tone.

Violinist Yeyeong Jenny Jin

“…playing a Domenico Montagnana violin, c.1735-39, which contributes to the dark beauty of her sound.”

As part of her MHIVC winner’s package, Jin has been loaned, for three years, a Domenico Montagnana violin, made in c.1735-39, through the Rare Violins of New York Consortium. This exquisite instrument no doubt contributes to the dark beauty of her sound.

The famous virtuosity of the devil’s trill is in the final movement, the violinist trilling while playing arpeggiated triads, and offering a bravura cadenza before the accompaniment returns for the dramatic ending. Jin thrilled the audience in this difficult movement, maintaining the impressive control of her violin she showed throughout the Sonata.  

Next came an opportunity for Kim to shine at the piano. Bartok’s Three Burlesques are a long way from the Baroque world of Tartini, composed in the early 20th century while Bartók was researching folk music in the Roumanian countryside. The three pieces are full of whimsical humour. The opening “Quarrel” was played with the rage implied by the title, the pianist almost at war with the piano. In “A little tipsy”, Kim’s playing of the wonky, dissonant music was marvellously characterful, while the third “Molto vivo” showed off his fleet virtuosity.

Ysaÿe may have emphasised emotional understanding over technical skills as quoted above, but his Sonata No 5 for solo violin nonetheless requires astonishing virtuosity, especially in the 2nd of the two movements, the super-challenging “Danse rustique”.  Jin dazzled with rapid bowing combined deftly with left-hand pizzicato while also expressing the passion of the piece.

The first half of the programme ended with Henryk Wieniawski’s Polonaise de concert, Opus 4. This romantic work combines brilliant passages for both violin and piano, and, in spite of the absence of any apparent visual rapport, these two young musicians found a fine sense of ensemble. Jin’s effortless playing, including rapid spiccato bowing, was particularly impressive.

Gillian Whitehead was the first composer commissioned to write a test piece specifically for the MHIVC. Her Bright Silence for solo violin was played by 18 competitors in 2001, and she remembers still how different each interpretation was. The piece, inspired by the landscapes of Central Otago, mountains, tussock, wind and birds, offers technical challenges, with an often-high tessitura, and also, without bar-lines, a lot of freedom for the violinist to shape the work.  Jin’s performance was both free and compelling, evoking the stark drama of the high peaks and the glissandi and grace-notes of korimako (bellbirds).

Two big, unashamedly virtuosic works completed the programme. Chopin’s solo piano work Andante spianoto revealed the beauties Kim could draw from his instrument. He found all the poetry one could wish for in effortless, gorgeous playing of a singing melodic line over an arpeggiated left hand. The piece leads directly by way of a fanfare to the Grande polonaise brilliante, a challenging tour de force for any pianist, parallel octaves and chromatic runs requiring strength, facility, speed and romantic grandeur. Kim was dazzling and triumphant right through to the show-off ending, then rose from the piano, acknowledged the enthusiastic applause with a curt nod, and left the stage. “Take that!” his demeanour suggested.  

Pianist Jeonghwan Kim

“…dazzling and triumphant in Chopin’s challenging tour de force.”

I was puzzled by Kim’s apparently surly manner throughout the concert. He seemed to toss off the music without any attempt to communicate directly with the audience or with his artistic partner, Jin, with whom he exchanged not a glance or a smile, though the musical rapport was there.

Camille Saint-Saëns’s Violin Sonata No 1 in D minor Opus 75 was a marvellous finisher for the programme. The opening movements were beautifully played, the playful Allegretto moderato bounced along and the rapid 4th movement, as molto an Allegro as it could be, ended the work and the concert with an exciting flourish. These two young musicians are virtuosi indeed, absolutely up for both the technical and the musical challenges, and clearly headed for bright futures.

The Young Virtuosi: Chamber Music New Zealand, in association with the Michael Hill International Violin Competition. Yeyeong Jenny Jin (violin) Jeonghwan Kim (piano) on tour to 11 New Zealand centres 27 October – 10 November, with concerts in Sydney on 16 November and Melbourne 18 November, 2024.