Five years after the release of "The Complete Works of Chopin's Piano Concertos", music fans have finally waited for Li Yundi's new album "Li Yundi Mozart Sonata Project - Salzburg".
On April 5, Warner Classical released "Li Yundi Mozart Sonata Project - Salzburg" worldwide, and changed the official YouTube page to the album cover, which shows the importance of it.
After the release of Li Yundi's new album, it received very high reviews around the world, and Warner Japan commented: "The Mozart at his fingertips is so lonely and so beautiful." Scala Radio, on the other hand, voted the album the best of the week.
With the release of the new album as the dividing line, in October 2023 and March 2024, Li Yundi started two overseas tours, one of the four-city tour of Australia has now come to an end, and the other tour of twenty cities in Europe has just begun. In the first performance in Freiburg, Germany on March 22, Li Yundi's perfect performance of the unity of the piano seemed to bring the audience back to the millennium.
In October 2000, Li Yundi participated in the 14th Chopin International Piano Competition held in Warsaw, Poland, and his "Chopin Concerto No. 1" amazed four audiences, making Li Yundi stand out from nearly 100 contestants from all over the world and win the gold medal, becoming the first and so far the only Chinese in the history of Chopin to win the gold medal. At the time, the Polish press said that "he knew Chopin better than the Poles".
Xiao Sai is the starting point for Li Yundi to embark on his career as a professional pianist, and it is also the starting point for the public to remember him. Now more than 20 years have passed, and the once talented young man has stepped into his life, and his music is also quietly transforming with the precipitation of experience.
From "know Chopin better than the Poles"
to "Pushing Mozart Music to the Top"
After the first performance in Freiburg, the authoritative German classical music magazine "CONCERTI" praised "Yundi performed the top Mozart" in the music critics, and the fans also gave high praise.
"At the beginning of the concert, I was completely impressed by Mozart's first movement 331, which had a sense of dialogue and just the right amount of momentum, as well as a sense of space and three-dimensionality. Mozart's music itself is very divine, and Li Yundi's thoughtful conception of each phrase and the exquisite combination of the keys at each touch perfectly convey the sacredness, diversity and purity of Mozart's music. ”
On March 22, Li Yundi's first performance on the European 20-city tour, and on March 27, the performance in Reutlingen, Germany, gathered music fans from different countries such as China, Germany, the United States and France. Since the beginning of the four-city tour in Australia, Li Yundi's every performance has been getting better.
In October 2023, Li Yundi started a four-city tour at Adelaide City Hall, Brisbane, Queensland Performing Arts Centre Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House, and Melbourne Palace Theatre. At the Sydney Opera House, the third stop of the tour, because the tickets for the pool seats on the first floor were quickly sold out, the organizers opened additional balcony boxes at the request of the audience, and the extra seats were also empty in seconds. It is not difficult to see Li Yundi's overseas influence, as a leader in the field of classical music, his audience is not only in China but also all over the world.
In February last year, Li Yundi posted a clip of playing K.310 online, and fans were speculating that the new album or tour selection might be related to Mozart, and it was true, and the Australian four-city tour repertoire consisted of four Mozart sonatas numbered K.331, K.310, K.475 and K.457. As for the level of this long-lost tour, it can be seen from the thunderous applause in the live video shot by the music fans, as well as the comments such as "shocking", "world-class" and "the most beautiful melody in the world" that frequently appear on social media at home and abroad.
Today, Li Yundi's 2024 Mozart Sonata Tour of 20 European Cities continues, and the new album "Li Yundi Mozart Sonata Project - Salzburg" will also be released worldwide on April 5.
Whether it is on music streaming platforms such as QQ Music and NetEase Cloud Music, or in communities such as Douyin, Weibo, Xiaohongshu, Bilibili, and WeChat Video Account, this album has received unanimous praise. In terms of quality, "Liyundi Mozart Sonata Project - Salzburg" does not deserve the high praise of "genius ingenuity, aging of time, sacrificial dedication, and wholehearted expression".
It can be seen that the European market also has a high evaluation of Li Yundi's 2024 tour and new album, and attaches great importance to it: the promotional video of the tour was featured on the German Capital TV, the German classical music magazine "CONCERTI" used a whole page to promote Li Yundi's new tour on the inside page of the March 2024 issue, and the authoritative British classical music magazine "Gramophone" published a promotional page for Li Yundi's European tour and new album on the back cover of the April issue. In addition, the German classical music magazine "Rondo Magazin" recently updated its Instagram, with the caption Li Yundi's new album.
Li Yundi's 2023 and 2024 are undoubtedly quite busy, but this state of immersion in music seems to be a treat for him. When preparing for the four-city tour in Australia, Li Yundi once shared a set of life photos, in which he looked quite relaxed, and this state lasted until the 20-city tour in Europe, and he was still the performer on the stage who could immerse the audience in the world of music when the fingertip notes flowed.
It is worth mentioning that in the performance of the Sydney Opera House in Australia last year, Li Yundi's encore repertoire was "Ode to the Yellow River", and many Chinese people wet their eyes at the end of the song. The melody of the imposing "Ode to the Yellow River" is undoubtedly a special existence for Chinese people around the world, and when the sound of the piano sounds, people seem to be able to travel through thousands of years to return to the thick and long national history and culture, and return to the national spiritual vein that is as brave as the Yellow River.
Judging from Li Yundi's past interviews, he not only takes "promoting classical music in China" as his goal, but also hopes to use his own strength to bring Chinese music to the world. Over the past decade or so, Li Yundi has indeed been seen playing Chinese music on stages around the world.
For example, in the 2012 "Red Romantic Piano Solo Concert" tour held in Paris, France, Li Yundi brought four piano pieces with oriental charm to European music fans, namely "Pi Huang" with quintessential Peking Opera elements, "In That Distant Place", "Colorful Clouds Chasing the Moon" and "Sunflower" adapted from folk music. Today, Li Yundi's performances of "Colorful Clouds Chasing the Moon" and "Ode to the Yellow River" have received very high hits on media platforms.
In a foreign country, "Ode to the Yellow River" as the encore song naturally condenses a special emotion of Li Yundi, as he once said: "Especially abroad, when I play Chinese works, that sense of pride arises spontaneously." Now, more than 10 years later, his original persistence has not changed.
Immerse yourself in the pure world of music
The New York Times called him a "lyrical prince-like genius", the Japanese conductor Seiji Ozawa praised him as a "true musical poet", and the authoritative classical music magazine Gramophone described Li Yundi's music as "as flawless as a diamond", but for ordinary listeners, they still remember Li Yundi's classic works one by one.
For example, Li Yundi has played one of the most difficult piano pieces in the world, "Bell", Liszt's original version is fascinating because of its chic and dazzling skills, while Li Yundi's version is delicate and quiet, with a kind of magic that can make people feel calm. In addition, Li Yundi's "Colorful Clouds Chasing the Moon" has also made many music fans unforgettable, compared with other versions of the interpretation, Li Yundi's version seems to let the audience step into the colorful clouds and feel the artistic conception of the beautiful scenery, which is undoubtedly a unique experience for music fans.
Music critic Norman Lebrecht gave Li Yundi a high evaluation of the version of Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata" when recommending different interpretations of Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata" that he admired most in his new book A good pianist often controls the flow of time and space when he plays, but Li Yundi is not like this, he loosens the bond between you and life, and brings you into a 12th-century Chinese painting, when the reality gradually disappears, only the vast landscape in the painting, and the small figure under the mountain may be you. ”
Using ink painting as a guide, this music critic cleverly and accurately pointed out the uniqueness of Li Yundi's music that is difficult to reproduce. Of course, no one in the field of art can say that anyone has reached the pinnacle of their understanding of music, but Li Yundi's perfect fusion of Western classical music with Chinese classical art and Eastern philosophy is the key to his music's ability to easily reach the soul of his listeners.
Today, Li Yundi's artistic attainments in the field of classical music are even more perfect. The Turkish March, the precursor to the new album "Liyundi Mozart Sonata Project - Salzburg", is familiar to many music fans, but the simplest is often the most difficult, which is why many listeners lack patience when enjoying the performance of some classic pieces. However, this time Li Yundi's version can be called clean and smooth, and every note seems to be just right, not one more or less.
"Li Yundi Mozart Sonata Project - Salzburg" includes four classic works of Mozart No. 11 (K.331), No. 8 (K.310), No. 14 Piano Sonata (K.457) and Fantasia (K.475), Mozart's piano sonata complex emotions and broad depth of thought, under the finger of Li Yundi one by one, under the finger of Li Yundi, just like Warner classical music critics say, he presents Mozart's music in pure, natural, personality changes, presented multi-layered and extraordinary.
In the 20 cities tour of Europe and the "Li Yundi Mozart Sonata Project - Salzburg", Li Yundi's music is still full of flesh and blood to the point of tears, and at the same time, his perfect control of musical lines, the unity of human and piano like a sacrifice, the extremely singing and dramatic performance, and the natural timbre technique are all long-lost, but more mature and sophisticated.
Li Yundi's musical expression in the new album, music fans obviously have a heart. "The most delicate and innocent version of the Turkish March, back to basics, without the slightest hint of showmanship. In my opinion, he has done a good job as early as Chopin's Ballade/Prelude series, and now he is basically harmonious with Mozart's sonatas. ”
The new album "Li Yundi Mozart Sonata Project - Salzburg" is five years apart from Li Yundi's last album "The Complete Works of Chopin Piano Concerto". In the past five years, Li Yundi seems to have tasted the music one by one a hundred times, pushed the rhythm of every note to the extreme, and returned to the pure music world, which is why there is such a flesh-and-blood "Li Yundi Mozart Sonata Project - Salzburg" today.
When he won the gold medal at the Chopin International Piano Competition in Warsaw, Poland, at the turn of the millennium, Li Yundi's talent naturally poured out, and it is difficult to imagine that this is a piece of music played by a teenager without looking at the stage. At that time, he had just come of age, his face was still immature, and the nervousness and uneasiness on his face were visible to the naked eye when the judges announced the rankings.
More than 20 years later, Li Yundi looks calm and restrained on the European tour, but his original intention for music has not changed, and his eyes are often moist in the face of thunderous applause from the audience. Now, Li Yundi has entered the age of establishment, and for performers with a long career cycle, the precipitation of life experience will eventually be transformed into the driving force on the road of music.