"Can I borrow your phone?" On the afternoon of December 13, on the stage of the Shanghai Mall Theater, pianist Chai Qiongyan asked reporters. The phone was handed over, and she placed it on the strings of the piano, one hand adjusting the position, the other hand on the key, the piano emitting a somewhat hoarse tone. Subsequently, she put different objects such as car keys and goblets on the strings in different positions, and the sound of the piano was constantly changing.
The concept of "feeding piano" was first proposed by the American avant-garde composer John Cage, who changed the vibration of the strings through "feeding" to achieve the purpose of changing the timbre. As early as 2006, Chai Qiongyan and polish pianist Peter Zhopanik brought the "dressing piano" to China. Chai Qiongyan said: "I put screws, candlesticks, coins, sponges, iPhone chargers, jade bi on the strings... The possibilities of 'adding pianos' are endless, and you can turn the piano into a new instrument according to your taste and imagination." ”
Goblets are placed on piano strings
On December 25 this year and January 1 next year, Chai Qiongyan will hold two concerts of "The Beginning of Man" and "Synesthesia Playground" at the Mall Theatre, which will not only use "additive piano" to interpret modern works, but also integrate artificial intelligence to interact with the sound of the piano, bringing the audience an imaginative audio-visual experiment.
Incarnate as a "mermaid" to perform avant-garde works
In the 1990s, Chai Qiongyan and Lang Lang were admitted to the Curtis Conservatory of Music, known as the "cradle of prodigy", and grew up to become a modernist pianist. Most of the repertoire in this concert is the work of contemporary composers she has worked with. Yarosław Kapsinski, dean of stanford University's School of Music, performed "Zhiyin", which she performed in "Shanghai Spring"; "Ping-Pong Concerto" author Andy Qiubao, who is a classmate of hers at the Manhattan Conservatory of Music, has just been nominated for a Grammy Award this year; and composer Tan Dun pays tribute to teacher John Cage's "C-A-G-E".
Chai Qiongyan prepares for the concert
Artificial intelligence was also used in the "The Beginning of Man" concert. NASA climate scientist Ian Fenty used visual data to reflect the effects of the greenhouse effect on water resources, and composer Ligetti's "Lecceka Suite No.1" and "Lecheka Suite No.7" were created based on these images. When Chai Qiongyan plays this set of works, the visual images generated by the artificial intelligence will interact with the piano tone in real time.
Synesthesia Playground also focuses on a concept – synesthesia. The word synesthesia consists of the Greek root syn (together) and aidsthesis (cognition) and represents "transsensory" experience. Once Chai Qiongyan played Debussy's "Fireworks", and her mind was full of colorful colors. She rushed out of the piano room and painted the picture in her head into a watercolor. In the concert, Chai Qiongyan will perform excerpts from Andy Akiho's "Synesthesia Suite" to mobilize the audience's different senses.
At the concert, Chai Qiongyan will also play the piano in the form of a "mermaid" on the screen: "I hope to appeal to the audience to cherish water resources, love nature, and protect the environment on which human beings live." ”
Chai Qiongyan AI concert Photo: Yang Yinying
Music should not be a one-way street
When it comes to contemporary music, there are often stereotypes of "ugly" and "obscure". At curtiss Conservatory, many piano students were reluctant to touch, but Chai Qiongyan "nibbled" off many difficult contemporary works little by little.
With a solid foundation in classical music, she studied the works of Beethoven, Mozart and Bach from an early age, but many times, she could only guess what they thought at that time from the stories and letters left by these composers. But after she began to contact contemporary works, she finally felt what it meant to be "like a fish in the water".
Most of the authors of these works are alive, and she can have in-depth communication and dialogue with each other. "We can get a deeper understanding of each other's preferences, tempers and even philosophies of life, and we can grind better music." Music should not be a one-way street, but a two-way channel for composers and performers to come and go, and there is communication. ”
Several contemporary composers presented this time are in Chai Qiongyan's view "different types of geniuses". She said that Tan Dun was like Picasso, "with rich creativity and boundless imagination", while Andy Qiubao, like Beethoven, "has a bit of a dual quality, emotional ups and downs", and Yarosław is like Mozart, "smart and elegant".
Chai Qiongyan still remembers the first time she performed "Additive Piano" in Shanghai in 2006, a ticket was hard to find, and there were extra seats on the scene, which made her see the curiosity and open vision of the Shanghai audience. "In fact, a lot of contemporary works are good and fun, and in New York, many of the people who come to listen to my performances are young people. Shanghai is my hometown, but also a big city with a wide range of rivers, here to perform modern works, I have the confidence, but also have the confidence to meet Zhiyin. ”