3 October 2022
Last Wednesday, the pianist, writer, lecturer and ABRSM examiner, Anthony Williams came into School to run our piano masterclass. Currently Head of Keyboard and Instrumental at Radley College, Anthony provided each of our pianists with 20 minutes of valuable ideas for their musical development and his knowledge, enthusiasm and insatiable energy certainly resonated with our pupils.
The evening opened with Yubo Gao, who was encouraged to open up his playing and think carefully about exploiting our Steinway piano to its full capacity. Charles Geday benefited from some detailed work on his technique after offering an impressive performance of the first movement of Beethoven’s Pathetique sonata. Thomas Zhang performed a Schubert Impromptu in a lovely delicate way and gained a lot from some careful consideration of pedalling in his playing. Walter Liu did some meaningful work on rubato, creating sustained melodic lines; and Laurence Peverall was encouraged to think more like a singer to bring out the lead line in his account of Schumann’s ‘Widmung’. The evening closed with a menacing rendition of Brahms’ Rhapsody in B minor from Daniel Zhang whose playing was greatly improved by Anthony’s encouragement to really exploit the dynamic contrasts in the piece to draw the audience in.
Our thanks must go to Anthony Williams for his insightful comments delivered in an incredibly gentle and constructive way; to Lynette Stulting, our head of Instrumental Studies, for putting together such a glorious masterclass; and to our students and teachers for all their work behind the scenes.