Tianwa Yang
Violinist Tianwa Yang has distinguished herself from the crowd of young violinists and has become a major star, especially in Germany, where she was partly trained. Yang's recordings have focused on virtuoso repertory, although she dislikes that term as applied to her own playing.
Yang was born in Beijing on April 8, 1987, and she showed talent immediately after taking up the violin at age four. Competition victories are key in climbing the ladder in China, and Yang entered her first one just eight months after starting to play. She won several competitions as a child and, at ten, was admitted to Beijing's Central Conservatory of Music. After an appearance at the Beijing Music Festival in 1999, she was invited to perform with violinist Isaac Stern in the U.S. A typical next step, followed by many other young Chinese musicians, would have been to apply to a U.S. conservatory, but Yang showed a characteristic independence of mind when, at 16, she headed for Germany alone. Supported by a German Academic Exchange Service scholarship, she pursued mostly chamber music studies there rather than pure violin work. One teacher she has credited with a strong influence on her playing is Baroque cellist Anner Bylsma, even though she has rarely performed on Baroque instruments. In 2007, Yang made debuts in Germany, touring with the Klassische Philharmonie Bonn, and in the U.S., at the Virginia Arts Festival. By then, she was already a veteran recording artist, having recorded Paganini's Caprices in 2000 for the Hugo Classical label. She moved to Naxos in 2004, beginning a cycle of the violin music of Pablo de Sarasate. Many of her recordings have focused on virtuoso repertory -- Paganini, Ysaÿe, Wolfgang Rihm -- although she told Geoffrey Newman of Vancouver Classical Music that "I've always tried not to sound virtuosic because, in my opinion, that's not something audiences are fundamentally interested in. I see little point in having all these people sitting there just witnessing technical feats." Her recordings have appeared almost exclusively on the Naxos label.
A professor of music at the Würzburg Conservatory and at the University of the Arts in Bern, Switzerland, Yang has toured widely in Europe and North America; her U.S. appearances include those with the Seattle, Baltimore, and Detroit Symphony Orchestras. She has won various awards, including the ECHO Klassik Instrumentalist of the Year in 2015. Increasingly often, she has returned to East Asia to perform; in 2019, she performed with the Shenzhen Symphony Orchestra in China. That year, Yang recorded the Brahms Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 77, with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin under Antoni Wit. Yang joined the ORF Vienna Radio Orchestra under Jun Märkl in 2021 for a recording of Prokofiev's Violin Concertos Nos. 1 and 2, and she returned in 2023, backed by pianist Nicholas Rimmer, for an album featuring the four violin sonatas of George Antheil. By that time, her recording catalog comprised some 25 items.
© James Manheim /TiVo
Similar artists
-
Antheil: Violin Sonatas Nos. 1-4
Kamermuziek - Released by Naxos on 9 jun. 2023
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Brahms: Violin Concerto & Double Concerto
Tianwa Yang, Berlin Deutsches Symphony Orchestra, Gabriel Schwabe, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 10 mei 2019
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Sarasate: The Complete Music for Violin & Orchestra
Tianwa Yang, Orquesta Sinfonica de Navarra, Ernest Martínez Izquierdo
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 1 jan. 2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Saint-Saëns: Works for Violin & Orchestra
Tianwa Yang, Malmö Symphony Orchestra, Gabriel Schwabe, Marc Soustrot
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 10 nov. 2017
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Concertos pour violon
Tianwa Yang, Jyvaskyla Sinfonia, Romain Descharmes, Patrick Gallois
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 25 jan. 2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Musique pour violon et piano (Volume 3)
Kamermuziek - Released by Naxos on 27 feb. 2012
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Wolfgang Rihm: Music for Violin & Orchestra, Vol. 2
Tianwa Yang, Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz, Darrell Ang
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 8 mrt. 2019
24-Bit 48.0 kHz - Stereo -
Eugène Ysaÿe : Sonatas for Solo Violin, Op. 27
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 28 apr. 2014
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Œuvres pour violon et piano (Intégrale)
Kamermuziek - Released by Naxos on 6 nov. 2012
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Castelnuovo-Tedesco: Violin Concertos
Tianwa Yang, SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg, Pieter-Jelle de Boer
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 3 feb. 2015
24-Bit 48.0 kHz - Stereo -
Wolfgang Rihm: Music for Violin & Orchestra, Vol. 1
Tianwa Yang, Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz, Christoph-Mathias Mueller
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 9 nov. 2018
24-Bit 48.0 kHz - Stereo -
Prokofiev: Violin Works
Tianwa Yang, Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, Jun Märkl
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 8 okt. 2021
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Sinfonía Buenos Aires
Daniel Binelli, Tianwa Yang, Nashville Symphony Orchestra, Giancarlo Guerrero
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 28 sep. 2010
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Lalo: Symphonie espagnole - Manén: Violin Concerto No. 1
Tianwa Yang, Orquestra Simfònica De Barcelona I Nacional De Catalunya, Darrell Ang
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 14 okt. 2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
The Best of Tianwa Yang
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 4 sep. 2015
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Musique pour violon & orchestre (Volume 2)
Tianwa Yang, Navarre Symphony Orchestra, Ernest Martínez Izquierdo
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 26 okt. 2010
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Transcriptions et Arrangements
Kamermuziek - Released by Naxos on 6 jan. 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Stravinsky: The Soldier's Tale Suite, Octet & Les noces
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 9 sep. 2016
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Musique pour violon et orchestre (Volume 1)
Tianwa Yang, Orquesta Sinfonica de Navarra, Ernest Martínez Izquierdo
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 1 okt. 2009
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Pablo Sarasate : Musique pour violon et orchestre (Volume 4)
Tianwa Yang, Navarre Symphony Orchestra, Ernest Martínez Izquierdo
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 30 sep. 2013
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Naxos January 2014 New Release Sampler
Kamermuziek - Released by Naxos Special Projects on 1 jan. 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo