Pianist Vadym Kholodenko joins Wheaton College for his Artist Series debut
"What is Music? How do you define it? Music is a calm moonlit night, the rustle of leaves in Summer. Music is the far off peal of bells at dusk! Music comes straight from the heart and talks only to the heart: it is Love! Music is the Sister of Poetry and her Mother is sorrow," said famous Russian pianist, composer and conductor Sergei Rachmaninoff.
All the spectrum of feelings and emotions that music evokes in a human soul appear when talented Ukrainian pianist Vadym Kholodenko touches the piano keys. That's when the miracle of transforming the beauty of this world into the beauty of music begins. Kholodenko will debut at Wheaton College Artist Series at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 12, at Edman Chapel, 401 E. Franklin St. in Wheaton.
This award winning musician is considered to be "one of the most musically dynamic and technically gifted young pianists" of our time. Kholodenko was born in 1986 in Kiev, Ukraine where his talent in playing piano was first discovered. At the age of 13, Kholodenko gave his first concerts in the U.S., China, Hungary and Croatia. He moved to Russia in 2005 to study at the Moscow State Conservatoire under renowned teacher, Professor Vera Gornostaeva. His thorough education, love to music, hard work and extraordinary talent brought him international fame and the love of audiences from all over the world.
Kholodenko's gentle, respectful and careful attitude towards the instrument of his life - piano - impresses every time he touches it. Piano and musician become one living organism producing the mesmerizing sounds of music, the music that lights up this world and changes it with its every sound and note. The talent of this great musician was recognized at the 2013 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition where Kholodenko won a gold medal. He also became a First Prize winner at the 2011 Schubert Piano Competition in Dortmund, a First Prize winner at the 2010 Sendai Piano Competition in Japan, and the Grand Prix winner at the Maria Callas Competition in Athens.
His upcoming performance in Wheaton is a must-see event for local classical music lovers.
More than that, when I got a chance to interview Vadym, I grabbed that opportunity and asked him to share with me his thoughts about his upcoming concert at Wheaton College Artists Series.
"I am very much looking forward to this concert; it is going to be my debut in the Chicago area," said Kholodenko said in an online interview with Natalia Dagenhart. "The program I have chosen reflects probably the best of my current musical preferences and tastes. The opening of the concerts, Maurice Ravel's 'Sonatine,' is beyond any doubt a masterpiece. Throughout his life, Ravel was persistently returning to a genres variety of his predecessors and 'Sonatine' continues those endeavors. The three movement work is written with very simple but no less expressive language. The cycle which follows called 'Miroirs' ('Reflections') contains five small pieces; each of them took immediately its place in the vast piano literature. Ravel gave us some hints by titling each single bagatelle: 'Moths,' 'Sad Birds,' 'A Boat in the Ocean,' 'The Jester's Aubade,' and 'The Valley of Bells.' The key I have found to an interpretation of both works is the same as one uses when being in front of a painting of an impressionist artist - you have to take a few steps back and perceive the painting in its entirety, focusing on the wholeness instead of discerning smallest details."
Talking about another giant of classical music, Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff and his music that is going to be presented at this concert, Kholodenko noted: "From the 'Valley of Bells,' I move to another composer who used the image of a bell as the most important figure of his oeuvre. Sergei Rachmaninoff's 10 Preludes, Op. 23, were written during the most productive period of the composer's life. In addition, I will play the famous Prelude in C-sharp Minor, Op. 3, No. 2, which Rachmaninoff was surely considering as a beginning of his gigantic 24 Preludes cycle. Restraining potential characters of this music to bells or any other single object would radically impoverish it. There is a reference to an old-fashioned minuet, a heroic but still a bit ironical march, bits of the Russian romance, a picture of a pushkinesque blizzard, besides others."
This thorough description of each piece and deep understanding of the music that is going to be performed demonstrate Kholodenko's precise knowledge of these compositions and his endless passion and love to music. He knows exactly how to demonstrate the ideas that the composers had put in their music, yet he adds the depth of his own soul and the warmth of his heart into each masterpiece he performs. "I hope the audience will enjoy this program as much as I do," added Vadym at the end of the interview.
Some might think that geniuses are only those who lived hundreds of years ago. No, they are among us, and Vadym Kholodenko is one of them.
For tickets, visit www.wheaton.edu or call (630) 752-5010.
Tickets are $45, $40 for seniors, and $10 for children and students. Wheaton College Artist Series also invites you to a pre-concert talk that will start at 6:30 p.m.