BY STEPHANIE ESLAKE
Welcome to our series, What the Fact?!
Throughout 2018, we’re teaming up with talent at the Australian National Academy of Music to bring you informed answers to real questions and topics about your music career.
Ever wondered why you feel performance anxiety? What the deal is with tuning to 440Hz – or not? How to lead an orchestra? We’re here to tell you all about it.
This time, we chat with Caleb Wong about the differences between performing with piano accompaniment, and performing with a full orchestra. After all, who better to ask than the very winner of the weekend’s ANAM Concerto Competition? (Congrats, Caleb!)
Caleb grew up in rural New South Wales, started studying cello when he was 6 years old, and is now in his third year of study at ANAM. In 2014, he was awarded the AYO Ernest Llewellyn Memorial Scholarship, followed by a 2015 Young Artist Festival Fellow at the Canberra International Music Festival, and a 2016 ANAM Concerto Competition finalist.
In light of his 2018 ANAM Concerto Competition win, we chat with Caleb about performing with others, whether it be piano accompaniment or a full orchestra.
Hacking the performance
Caleb, not going to lie. You’re a very high achiever (you received your AMusA/LMusA in cello and AMusA in piano with distinction by 15?!). What’s your musical life been like so far?
Music has been a huge part of my life since as far back as I can remember. I had three older sisters who all started before me that I would observe and imitate. We lived pretty far from any music teachers, and drove every few weeks to Sydney for lessons. The big turning point was probably when I started studying under Uzi Wiesel who lived nearby. At that point, I began taking the cello much more seriously.
Anything I’ve achieved so far wouldn’t have been possible without the support and encouragement from my family and teachers.
You’ve revisited the ANAM Concerto Competition once again, after you were a finalist in 2016. What knowledge did you bring from your 2016 competition into your winning performance this month?
Performing the Elgar with the TSO was [a] thrilling performance. It was absolutely intoxicating. I like to think my playing has improved since then!
The Sinfonia Concertante is a completely different beast to the Elgar. I wouldn’t have been ready to attempt it two years ago. Having more experience playing with orchestra, I’m now much more aware of an orchestra’s limits, where I can and can’t use rubato. Being able to project the low register of a cello against an orchestra can also be a struggle, but having a better instrument this time around certainly helps.
For this concert, you’ve chosen the Prokofiev Sinfonia Concertante, Op. 125. Why this work, and what are the biggest challenges within?
This concerto is among the most difficult cello concertos ever written. It is a marathon to play. I fell in love with it the first time I heard it, and I feel like its style brings out the best aspects of my playing.
Prokofiev rewrote this concerto with the help of Rostropovich, so it’s interesting to see which parts are influenced by him. I would say the biggest challenge for me is having accuracy in the shifts, as the left hand is constantly jumping so no notes can be taken for granted.
You were backed by one of the best orchestras in Australia when you performed it. What do you need to consider when it comes to your relationship with the other players?
I am so incredibly lucky to be able to perform with an orchestra of this calibre. They are all lovely people and very welcoming.
This work is not a typical concerto, but Prokofiev specifically labelled it a symphony concerto to emphasise the equal roles of both soloist and orchestra. There are quite a few melodies and small duets I get to play with different instruments throughout the orchestra. It’s important for me to adjust to listening and connecting in multiple directions and distances, rather than just the piano next to me.
So what’s the dynamic between you and the conductor?
A concerto is a duet between me and the conductor – just his instrument is much bigger. When the orchestra can’t hear me or vice versa, he is there to keep us together. Ideally, we get to have a play-through with a pianist to work out a few potentially tricky sections beforehand. In a concerto, conductors are often very accommodating with tempi and flexibility, but also are able to let us know when certain things are unpractical and have many of their own suggestions as well.
How does this differ to your experience with an accompanist?
Pianists are often able to play certain things quicker and more adaptively than an full orchestra, so there are often places where I will take something too far without realising.
A piano reduction will also be missing many notes, so sometimes there are subdivisions in a part I am unaware of. Collaborating with a pianist is still a wonderful way of music-making and can be just as rewarding.
Obviously, you can book a few rehearsals with an accompanist before a performance – and this comes with the potential to share a dialogue with this player. But how do you prepare and rehearse for a full concerto experience?
I am incredibly lucky to have been working with Louisa Breen on this piece. She somehow makes the piano have the strength and variety in sounds of an orchestra. There were a couple rehearsals we had where she deliberately held back in places to give me a feel for what it would be like playing with orchestra.
When it comes down to it…do you prefer playing with orchestra, or accompaniment?
I would have to say playing with orchestra. It is such an empowering and euphoric experience. I also love playing as loud as possible and leaving nothing in the tank, so playing with orchestra is perfect for that.
What advice would you give to others wishing to perform a concerto with orchestra?
Listen attentively. Listen to recordings and become as familiar as possible with everyone else’s parts. Listen to the orchestra while you’re performing. Listen to as much feedback and advice you can as well.
What has performing a concerto taught you about playing music with simple accompaniment?
Music-making with others is one of the things I love most. The skills learnt and used don’t change all that much with the number of people involved. At the end, it’s about having an open mind, open ears, having humility, and respecting your fellow musicians.
If you’d like to listen to ANAM Musicians doing their thing, visit the website – the 2019 program has just been announced!
READ NEXT: WTF?! How many hours a day should I spend practising?
We’re partnering with ANAM to hook up with some of the strongest talent in the world in our new educational series! Check back in soon for our next What the Fact?! with professionals in the music industry.
