Joyce Yang Plays Eight Festivals This Summer – Including Vail (July 21), Aspen (July 29-Aug 1) and Ravinia (Aug 22) – and Records First Duo Album with Violinist Augustin Hadelich

This summer, Joyce Yang – a pianist BBC magazine praises for her “bold and modern” sound – performs in eight festivals across the U.S., and she reunites with favored partner Augustin Hadelich for several violin-piano recitals and their first duo recording session. This month’s recording session, to be held at the State University of New York in Purchase for a future Avie release, will see them tackle works that they have showcased on tour worldwide: two Romantic-era masterpieces, Schumann’s Violin Sonata No. 1 and Franck’s Violin Sonata, as well as the disparate 20th century works Tre Pezzi by György Kurtág and André Previn’s Tango, Song and Dance. The South China Morning Post, reviewing a Yang-Hadelich performance at a festival in Hong Kong last year, marveled over the duo’s “subtle invention and variety of color.”

Joyce's tour of summer festivals includes duo recitals in Colorado with Hadelich at Bravo! Vail (July 21) and the Aspen Music Festival (July 30-Aug 1), with the repertoire including pieces from the upcoming recording session as well as Stravinsky, Janácek and works by Mozart, Beethoven and Dvorák in league with cellist Christopher Costanza. Yang and Hadelich unveiled their trio with guitarist Pablo Villegas for a “Tango, Song and Dance” program at the Kennedy Center last year, with the Washington Post lauding its “fluidity and flair.” The trio reprises the program at the Grand Teton Music Festival in Wyoming (Aug 3). Capping their summer together, Yang meets up again with Hadelich for a duo recital at the Ravinia Festival (Aug 22). Yang’s summer also includes a solo recital at the Southeastern Piano Festival at the University of South Carolina in Columbia (June 17).

The New York Times, which has described Yang’s playing as “vivid and beautiful,” said of her collaborative skills: “Alongside her burgeoning career as a soloist and concerto performer, pianist Joyce Yang has also demonstrated impressive gifts as a chamber musician.” When she was just 19 years old she won the Best Chamber Music Performance award at the 2005 Cliburn competition, teaming with the Takács Quartet. As Takács first violinist Edward Dusinberre puts it, “She delights in chamber music.” Underscoring that fact will be her summer performances in the Seattle Chamber Music Festival (July 13, 15, 17), New York’s Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival (Aug 9-10) and California’s La Jolla Chamber Music Festival (Aug 14, 18), with the repertoire ranging from Mozart, Brahms and Franck to Taneyev, Bernstein and Kevin Puts.

Yang’s run at the Aspen Music Festival – where she has been a favorite for years – will also feature her in a night of orchestral works by De Falla (Nights in the Gardens of Spain) and Liszt (Totentanz) with the Aspen Philharmonic conducted by Rafael Payare (July 29).