— Han-Na Chang, Music Director, QPO
By Anand Holla
A thick spiral-bound book of notations for Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5 in E Minor rests on a table. Next to it is a set of conductor’s batons that look like unwieldy chopsticks. Poised over them is Han-Na Chang, her self-assured persona perpetually in flight, effortlessly making sense of it all
“Orchestra is a unique phenomenon in music,” says the zippy Music Director of the Qatar Philharmonic Orchestra, at a rehearsal room next to the Opera House in Katara, “Where else do you have 100 people coming together as one body? Every conceivable combination of sound is possible in an orchestra. That’s why composers like Beethoven and Tchaikovsky wrote symphonies for orchestra, fully aware of its limitless possibilities, pouring in everything they had in them.”
Widely regarded as one of the finest conductors of her generation, Chang is all set to take QPO along and make her conducting debut next week at the BBC Proms, often hailed as the greatest classical musical festival. Reaching this point within a year of taking over the colossal task of unifying the sounds of the 101 musicians of QPO, the South Korean maverick sure has turned the orchestra into a symphonic tour de force.
As for constantly moving forward, it’s a habit Chang got into as a child. At three, she started studying piano, and at six, she took to cello.
In 1994, 11-year-old Chang took part in the Mstislav Rostropovich Cello Competition in Paris, only so she gets to perform before the legendary Russian cellist. She ended up winning the first prize. Of her performance, Rostropovich said, “I did not play as well as her at that age… I have never heard anything like it.”
Interestingly, Chang defies the downward curve that often beleaguers child prodigies as they grow up. “I never saw myself as a child prodigy,” she says, “Rostropovich stressed to me that he didn’t want me to make the same mistakes he made. He had become a professor at a very young age, and had to be responsible, both, for his family and other young musicians. He missed having the luxury of maturing naturally.”
No surprise then that Chang took it easy. “My growing up years were very relaxed. I always had time to study, rest, go to normal school, and have non-musician friends. Having more than enough time to grow as a person and as a musician is probably most vital,” the 31-year-old says.
When she was 10, Chang’s family took her to New York to study at the Juilliard School with master cellist Aldo Parisot, and all through her teens, Chang fetched considerable acclaim as a cello player. Around the time she went to the university, Chang found herself being pulled into another seemingly spectacular realm of music.
“I realised I wasn’t happy being just a cellist and I wanted to study classical music,” she says, “I felt like I was looking into a microscope and analysing every single note written for the cello. While that seemed wonderful, because familiarity and intimacy brings you extra freedom and confidence, I wondered — where do I go from here?” That’s how Chang began poring over symphonies. “It was a natural evolution,” she says.
Although an orchestra can’t play a note without the nod of the conductor, Chang feels a conductor must merely help the musicians’ hearts, bodies and instruments get the sound the conductor wants.
“A conductor doesn’t take control, but helps the orchestra give the best possible performance in the easiest way. It’s about making the process as simple, powerful and efficient as possible,” she explains.
A constant endeavour of that process is to distil a distinct QPO sound, which Chang is still exploring, discovering. “If you can compare QPO to a person’s life, it’s in its infancy. However, infancy is the most crucial time as that’s when you form ideas about the world or hear your first words and sounds. What you take in as a toddler influences the kind of adult you will become,” she says.
The key to orchestral playing is listening, believes Chang. “You must listen to the players around you. We have come to do that much more, by listening, and blending our sound,” she says.
As QPO’s music director, Chang knows she needs to have a clear vision and imagination of what the orchestra’s sound will be, can be, and should be.
“It takes years of training,” she admits, “You want to be able to identify the orchestra by listening to it; like the Vienna Philharmonic, or the Berlin Philharmonic. Great orchestras have a very strong projection of their own identity in terms of their sound.” And the conductor, under whom the orchestra thrives, is, of course, as critical.
“The association between the orchestra and the conductor and how closely and constantly they are able to evolve is key. It’s like fermentation. You need time together, to sculpt and mould the sound. Meanwhile, you want to be able to express the different works you perform with different sounds. For instance, you can’t play Mozart with the sound you play Shostakovich in. Each composer demands something unique of you. My goal, ultimately, is to convey what the composer wanted,” she says.
Since the foundation of an orchestra lies in the strings section, Chang likes to have them blended as if they are one giant, mellifluous instrument.
“I must decide whether the musicians must use their bows at the same speed, should the pace of their vibratos be slow or fast, and should I get every musician to do exactly the same thing, and so on,” she says, of the endless permutations a conductor needs to consider.
And once you add the woodwind section like the horns, trumpets, trombones, and tubas, to the strings, the sound gains a new sparkle, Chang feels. “How the wind section then is able to play together, how each of them individually contribute, musically and sonically; it’s all quite complex,” she says, smiling.
Simplifying the complex becomes most necessary when interpreting a maestro’s piece of music. Pointing at parts of Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony notations that suddenly burst into dramatic highs, Chang elaborates on the conductor’s need to internalise the composer’s heart-wrenching emotions and upheavals.
“My job is to feel the piece of music as if it came from inside of me, and then I have to share with the orchestra what I have discovered,” she says.
The near-precise interpretation though can be drawn from the piece only after a thorough study. “What the composer thought and felt in the composition is most important to us,” says Chang.
Helming Qatar’s flagship orchestra, whose 101 artistes come from more than 30 countries, Chang finds strength in the ensemble’s diversity.
“It’s truly international,” she proudly says, of her group that was painstakingly selected from 2,600 musicians who auditioned over six weeks across 10 cities, six years ago.
“It’s a miracle that, in the Middle East, where the tradition of classical music is so young, we have a permanent home-based orchestra like QPO. If done well, this can be a focal point for the coming together of Western and Eastern music. How music from this part of the world sounds like when heard right next to Bach or Tchaikovsky makes for a very compelling evening,” Chang says.
Chang certainly knows a thing or two about stirring up compelling evenings merely by waving her magic wand — her baton — at a stage teeming with musicians. That’s because she guest stars and collaborates with the choicest of orchestras across the world.
Her passion though isn’t limited to performing alone. Driven to introduce great classical masterpieces to a wider audience, Chang founded the annual Absolute Classic Festival in Korea in 2009. “Some call classical music as old, grandparents’ music. But it couldn’t be more relevant today,” she says.
The pursuit of excellence doesn’t tire Chang. In fact, she finds succour in harnessing QPO’s youthful energy and passion. “My task is to get that energy out of them every single day. I have to ask for it. It doesn’t come easy. But I enjoy it a lot,” Chang says.
While orchestras may embody different personalities, sincerity is what ultimately shines through, feels Chang. “What counts is how much we care about the music we play, the sounds we make,” she says, “That’s also perhaps, why I can never answer which performance is my favourite, because I am always looking forward to tomorrow.