“Oh, that’s great. nice to meet you. I am also the top in my department.”
“uh? Do you share the same thing with composer? That’s the first time I’ve heard of it.”
“Well, but first of all, my skills are the best.”
“Ahahahaha, you’re funny.”
Chris and Heather got along a lot better than I thought. Heather flirted like that for a while, then looked at Rowoon and asked.
“How is your professor?”
“I do not know. I met him once at the office, and other than that, I only listened to the lecture once. After listening to today’s lesson, it will be a little different. Is your professor… Professor Donatti?”
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Normally, I would not be able to remember the name of another professor so clearly. However, his name was bound to leave a deep impression on Rowoon. It was because of work a few days ago. When he happened to run into Donatti while walking on campus, he stopped Rowoon and talked about this and that for a while.
— Ah, you Luo, Luo Yun. The friend who played that Chopin!
— But that’s how you pronounce your name, right? Luoun. Are you okay? hahahaha, I also practiced separately. Even doing a Google search.
— Hey, your performance was so good. It’s been a while since I’ve been stimulated. I have to say that I wanted to go on stage again.
— Yes, yes. There are still many things missing. But lacking is not a bad thing. The problem is when there is nothing lacking, but there is no charm. you are attractive That’s it.
— If you feel sorry for a professor, you can come over to me. you know what i mean
‘······This is the first time I’ve ever received such a warm look from a man.’
It was almost as though Donatti was in love with Rowoon. Han, the professor in charge, showed a rather flat attitude, while Donatti’s eyes were dripping with honey as he looked at Rowoon.
So I couldn’t help but wonder a little about Heather’s words.
“huh. Our professor is very chic.”
“… you say you’re chic?”
“You haven’t seen it? Keep your words very short and give a rough greeting. I had a lesson yesterday too? But I don’t even know how many words we talked. Are you introverted or are you tired?”
I don’t think you have an introverted personality.
Instead of spitting out those words, Rowoon held the corn soup in his mouth. The savory taste of the corn soup, still warm, slowly drove away the drowsiness that hadn’t left yet.
Waking up, instead of focusing on Chris and Heather’s conversation, Reason began to follow the life of the man who had been obsessed with him for the past month. List. Why, why did he live with him? During the time he was with Marie, why couldn’t his heart stay with her?
Was it because she was too aristocratic? Did her penchant for balls and trinkets and ostentation, though attractive at first, wear him out as time went on?
If that’s the case, then why did you stay by her side?
In fact, Rowoon didn’t know the answer at all. Because the composition journal helped him feel the thoughts and feelings that Liszt had at the time.
But Liszt was equally unsure of my own mind. All Rowoon could do was feel and accept that uncertainty. Of course, questions still remained, but questions gave birth to thoughts, and as thoughts grew longer, Rowoon got closer to Liszt one step at a time.
Adjust all your senses to Liszt. The way you walk, your voice, your expression, your way of speaking, and even your thoughts.
The pianist who was the most cheered and loved among the pianists who existed in the 19th century music world, no, in history. In terms of being a ‘star pianist’, he brings up the soul of a man who was so unrivaled that no one could overwhelm him.
The feeling of being in ill-fitting clothing plagued him, but he could ignore it. Even considering Han’s expectations, I really wanted to show a list-like appearance more than anyone else. And Rowoon knew I had the ability to make that wish come true.
“Are you going to do it at the LA Piano Competition? I didn’t know there was Liszt’s Mazepara… virtuoso temperament. I thought that the technical side was not specialized.”
“Yes, technical playing is not my specialty.”
“Still, why did you choose the LA Piano Competition? If I wanted to avoid a song like this, I would have had a few other options.”
“Because it’s not my specialty, I can’t put it off. I did my best.”
“······Well, what’s the point of talking for a long time? Try playing first. Let’s talk later.”
Han’s eyes were strange. It seemed to be expected, but at the same time, it seemed that it was not. Rowoon’s performances he had seen so far would have been difficult to describe as list-like in any way, so it was not unreasonable for him to be puzzled.
But Rowoon wasn’t worried. He was confident that he could solve Han’s doubts. I was confident to make him understand.
You don’t have to keep talking about hurting your mouth. Rowoon sighed slowly. And he slowly began to think of a song to play.
A song arranged by Liszt 4 times.
A song whose title was inspired by a poem by Victor Hugo. Mazepa.
He meets Countess Marie d’Agu and begins to fall in love, until the love is lost. And countless new love finds, and until Liszt finally meets and settles down with Duchess Wittgenstein, a song that melts all those times.
The song that most people simply call ‘Mazepa, a practice song for Liszt’s transcendent technique’ was so diverse in Rowoon’s world.
And Rowoon knew that those various songs were actually the songs that Liszt wanted to express.
Only Rowoon could know.
‘Yes, maybe my role… is to bring your voices back to the world.’
Will Han recognize the voice? I hope you understand. I hope he can convey that voice.
Rowoon started playing in that wind.
And, Han listened.
listened and thought
‘······Technology isn’t his specialty?’
I looked at Rowoon’s fingers, which were moving like a spider on the keyboard and digesting Liszt’s transcendent skills.
Looking at Rowoon’s face, who is already immersed in my performance and has an expression as if he can’t hear anything or see anything,
And I feel the corners of my mouth being pulled tight in a shudder,
‘Father.’
How did you give me such a treasure, asking God again.
＜ Weird Freshman (2) ＞ End
＜ Strange Freshman (3) ＞
Rowoon’s performance was so impressive that Han couldn’t help but think that way.
Rowoon himself may not be conscious of it properly. However, his hands were buried with the playing methods of various musicians. Beethoven, Bach, Chopin, and Liszt.
Beethoven’s daring sensibility that seems to be banging down.
Bach, who could not be beaten by anyone in the performance competition of the Baroque era.
Chopin is a master of improvisation and has overwhelming lyricism that cannot be compared to anyone else.
And the virtuoso pianist’s god-like list.
From the trivial habits they have to their characteristics, Rowoon’s playing method already had a lot of things mixed in.
Of course, it was Liszt’s habits for the most part that stood out as distinctive right now. Right now, Rowoon was the performer I spent the most time on, and this was Liszt’s song.
However, all the composers buried on Liszt’s song, and Rowoon’s colors, made this performance feel different from Liszt’s.
Perfection is incomparable. The opponent is a list. Even if he reached playing level 10, he was a gigantic giant who would dare to compete with him.
Even so, Rowoon’s current performance is full of inexpressible possibilities.
‘It’s strange.’
The more he listened to Rowoon’s performance, the more Han felt something unusual. It feels like not just one pianist, but several pianists playing alternately or simultaneously.
It was a feeling I could neither understand nor explain. But that’s why Rowoon’s performance sounded even more special. Although he had seen pianists who could perfectly play Liszt’s Mazepa without a single miss, it was rare to find a pianist who made Han’s mind so complicated. No, at least not among his disciples.
Someone would call such a performance ‘scarce’. Perhaps if Han was here as a pianist, he might have accepted this performance that way. But now he was a professor before he was a pianist. I was in a position to teach, raise, and guide Rowoon.
And to him, this lack, this strange lack, seemed like the possibility of becoming anything.
Besides, it’s a lack of words, Rowoon’s playing was so well-balanced that it’s hard to think of it as someone who hasn’t taken a single lesson.
I don’t know if it’s a normal difficulty song. It was hard to come up with a song like Mazepa. Mazepa was the most difficult of the transcendental technique exercises. At most, 5 songs were considered more difficult than Mazepa, and Mazepa was considered a song with a high level of difficulty that was difficult to express technically and musically.
There are many reasons to name. First of all, it goes without saying that, just like Liszt’s songs, leaps in octave units (a method of quickly moving one’s hands over a certain distance on the keyboard) often appear. There was another reason why Mazepa was considered particularly difficult.
‘······ Fingering as instructed in the list.’
Fingering: how many fingers should press a particular key.
Liszt was famous for being quite obsessed with fingering when composing, and Mazepa was a song that showed off that Liszt’s obsession.
And the reason for this was the so-called ‘horseshoe’ part that appeared in the first two sections.
The part expresses the sound of horses hooves that Mazepa must have heard when he was caught up in adultery with the countess and banished to the wilderness tied to a horse.
In this part, Liszt instructed to express the consecutive triple folds (folds such as sea bream, lepa, and misole) he wrote to express a horseshoe using only his ring finger and index finger. A non-major might ask what’s wrong with this, but think about it. The snapper should be hit with the ring and index fingers of the left hand, and the lepa should be struck with the same finger of the same left hand.
After the second double note, the next double note is played twice with the right hand and then twice with the left hand to digest the double notes alternately, and then again with both hands to express the spur of each word cut out form.
Many pianists have given up using only the index and ring fingers when playing double notes to get rid of unnatural movements, and even tried to connect notes naturally by using the thumb and middle finger together.
‘It’s something that the list will wail.’
There is a reason why the list bothers to write down the fingering number for each note. If you are a pianist, you have to play with the determination to melt that unnatural movement itself into the music. Of course, making that stiff connection beautiful musically would be a very difficult task, but isn’t that why they’re called pros because they do it?
In that sense, I couldn’t help but be very satisfied with Rowoon’s current performance. Rowoon was following Liszt’s intentions as they were. It was a surprise. Han didn’t have time to give me a single decent piece of advice on this performance. Nonetheless, Rowoon persevered and played along with Liszt’s strange fingering.
No, it’s simply not on that level. Rowoon was sublimating the unnaturalness of the arrangement of his fingers into the sound of the horse’s asymmetrical hooves.
‘how? I haven’t even been given lessons.’
Nonetheless, Rowoon’s playing sounded like someone who had already taken enough lessons. How the hell is that even possible? In Han’s question, Rowoon’s performance ran toward the end. There was no miss. But it wasn’t such trivial misses that Han cared about.
When a pianist practices, the important thing is the skeleton after all. Depending on how hard and beautiful the skeleton is, when flesh is attached to it, a work worthy of a work of art is born.
And Rowoon’s skeleton is…
“······Roun. Have you taken lessons on this song before?”
“no. doesn’t exist.”
“Then how did you prepare?”
“I did some research on Liszt’s life.”
“Life?”
Han gave a puzzled look at the unexpected answer. Rowoon sat on the piano chair with his buttocks on and only his legs turned to face Han.
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“yes. I thought it would be better to know in what environment this was composed and for what purpose it was written.”
“······Seeing you say that, you must have done your research fairly well?”
“At least I think we all know what happened when this song was written.”
I was confident in that part. Rowoon didn’t read other people’s thesis, because he directly looked into the life of Liszt. Where else could there be a more certain and perfect investigation than that?