« All nearby programs

Book Junwen Liang for a groupmuse

Romantic Encounters


Details

Junwen Liang full profile / Solo Piano / 1 musician


Full program notes

Selections from Les Reves de Colombine Op. 65 Amy Beach
Valse Amoureuse
Danse d’Arlequin

Adoration Florence Price
Etude

From Rodgers & Hammerstein Transcriptions: Stephen Hough
The King and I: Hello, Young Lovers
The Sound of Music: My Favorite Things

Selected movements for “The Banquet” Sonata for Piano Tan Dun

The Mask
Only For Love

Ballade No. 4 in f minor, Op. 52 Frederic Chopin
Nocturne in D-flat major, Op. 27 No. 2
Rondo a la mazur, Op. 5


Historical context

This program "Romantic Encounters" traces the evolving spirit of Romanticism across more than a century of musical imagination, revealing how composers have continually reinterpreted intimacy, longing, and theatrical expression. The program opens with works by Amy Beach and Florence Price—two composers who expanded the Romantic tradition within an American context. Beach’s Les Rêves de Colombine, inspired by characters from the commedia dell’arte, blends lyricism and playful fantasy, while Price’s Adoration and Étude reflect a deeply expressive voice shaped by both European Romantic idioms and African American musical heritage. Together, these works offer intimate reflections marked by warmth, elegance, and emotional directness.

The program then moves into the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, where Romantic sensibility finds new forms of expression. Stephen Hough’s transcriptions of songs from The King and I and The Sound of Music transform beloved musical-theatre melodies into virtuosic piano works, preserving their lyric charm while elevating them within the concert tradition. Tan Dun’s The Banquet Sonata, composed for piano and inspired by Chinese opera and ritual, presents a modern, theatrical reimagining of emotional expression—its movements evoking masks, love, and inner drama through a highly personal, cross-cultural language.

The program concludes with Frédéric Chopin, whose music stands at the heart of Romantic piano literature. The Ballade No. 4, Nocturne in D-flat major, and Rondo à la mazur reveal different facets of his poetic voice—ranging from introspective lyricism to rhythmic vitality drawn from Polish dance. In these works, personal expression and formal innovation meet with remarkable depth, offering a fitting culmination to a program that explores Romantic encounters across time, culture, and musical language.


Videos from this player


Other programs from this ensemble