FINE TALENT: When performing live, Park simply “lets the music pass through her.” Photo by Paul Thuysbaert Photography
By Anand Holla
At a private section of the chic Italian restaurant Paper Moon, Sonja Park takes a seat. Turned up in a slick black ensemble topped with a black leather jacket, Park looks like a Gen-Y rock star. Once she starts talking, softly and lucidly as she does, it feels easier to deduce who she really is — a concert pianist.
That said, Park is a total rock star on the piano, where rock star would refer to someone at the top of their game. “The journey has been amazing,” she says, when asked about how she looks back at her passage from being a child prodigy to an accomplished artiste.
Seoul-born Sonja (pronounced Sonya) Park remembers her earliest influence of music as being surrounded by it at home. “Since my mother was a piano teacher and a music school director, she wanted me to master an instrument. I grew up absorbing a lot of music,” she says.
Mostly a self-taught pianist, Park, through her teens, toured the world with the Korean National Men’s Choir and even got a Degree in Music Pedagogy and Pedagogy with distinction. “But I didn’t want to be a musician. I wanted to be a journalist,” she says.
At 21, Park performed in Vienna where Professor Alexander Jenner heard her and was so taken in by her flair that he insisted she studied at the University of Music and Drama in Vienna, where she eventually earned a Degree in Piano Performance with distinction. “Meeting Jenner changed my life. Those years opened me up and connected me to my passion for music,” she says.
What worked for Park, also, is to not have followed the path that most music students take — of unrelenting practice. “In fact, I never really focused on practicing too much. I didn’t like it,” she admits.
The reason for that could be her being blessed with a natural talent for tickling the ivories to life, navigating the niceties of each key that seem as familiar to her as perhaps her slender fingers themselves.
It’s hard to keep count of how many competitions or accolades Park has won. Only last month, she was acknowledged as the first Steinway Artist in the Arabian Gulf region, joining an illustrious list featuring 1700 prolific pianists in the world.
Yet she is modest about her artistry. When she plays compositions of Western Classical music greats, she instinctually understands her responsibility.
“Basically, I am just a messenger of the composer,” she reasons, “I try to figure out what he or she wanted to convey, and then I try to play it exactly as they would have wanted by following the notations and signs all through them. I simply let the music pass through me.”
Experiencing Park perform seems like, to say the least, a privilege to the senses. Last May, for instance, at her concert where she performed masterpieces of Romantic Era greats such as Beethoven, Mozart and Chopin, was ethereal and uplifting at once, drawing hearty applause from a packed Opera House at Katara.
It makes complete sense then that she likes to call herself “a pianist who moves people.” And Park is as bewitchingly good when she performs solo, as she is when she collaborates with top talents. To experience her range, catch her at the new classical concert series titled Close-Up, where she teams up with Anton Sorokow, 1st Concert Master of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, at The St. Regis Doha on February 4.
Talking of concerts, what exactly goes on in Park’s mind when she is on stage? “If I start to observe myself, the concert is already over,” she says, laughing, “It’s like one big drama piece, like theatre. I am not acting but I am in the middle of it. I am a real character. Basically, I have to perform out of heart. So I must concentrate immensely and then all I do is feel the music. Just feel it.”
In other words, when she is on stage playing, she stops thinking. “It’s as if my mind has switched off. It’s only when somebody’s phone in the audience rings, which happens quite often here in Qatar,” she says, smiling, “that I am pulled back into the place where I actually am. That’s the moment I return to ‘thinking’ so as to recover. Then, I seamlessly return to my piece, and switch off again.”
Each time she summons focus, music comes rushing to her. “When I play that music, some chemical things happen within me which we call emotions, and which I can’t plan or learn. It just happens. And when I feel the music through my emotions, those beautiful masterpieces turn into some kind of magic,” Park explains, as if she likes being lost in that world.
“Then it goes to the audience, and they feel happy, sad or some emotion. There, another chemical reaction happens, which wanders and returns to me. Together, mine and the audience’s energies meet, which I find to be the most beautiful thing. That’s why I am so addicted to playing music,” she says.
“Those who attend my concert could be music lovers or those who aren’t well versed with it. But it doesn’t matter because I always try to communicate through my music and I sense that everybody goes back home with some sort of impact,” she says, giggling, “Hopefully, a good impact!”
Given how goodness is at the heart of her relationship with music, it’s not hard to guess Park’s motto in life. “It is to share my love and passion with the whole world and touch people’s hearts. You know like everything that gives you warmth, like when you watch great movies or listen to your favourite songs,” she explains, “Music really permeates into your soul. When you feel sad, you listen to sad songs and your emotion is enhanced. And that’s basically what I am doing when I play.”
It’s this dedication that prompted Park and her husband Joris Laenen, a trumpet and piano player and also a founder of the Tango Nuevo Project, to found the non-profit initiative Moving Young Artists (MYA), which aspires to develop music education programmes for children, and also find, support and encourage local talent.
“I feel obliged to bring more music into Qatar,” she says, moments before a performance of bright young talents — many of who are students of Qatar Music Academy (QMA) — would be underway at the main dining area of Paper Moon, as part of a series of such monthly sessions.
As for her own musical voyage, she confides that sometimes, she does feel the need to express her emotion with her musical voice rather than playing something that’s written. But she hasn’t really gotten down to composing. “In my teens, I composed. But somehow, I became too shy. Honestly, I don’t have that time for it either because it has to happen naturally. If I sit down and tell myself to compose, it will never come.”
Even Joris has asked her to give it a shot. “I promised him that I will compose at least one piece for him because on our wedding, he had composed an incredible song for me as a gift,” she says, smiling, “I plan to begin, this year. So, perhaps the next time around, you will interview me about my new album.”
What does she think is the most important ingredient that a musician must have towards his or her music? “Everybody has their own formula; for some it is rigorous practice, and for some it is passion,” she says, “You have to find your own formula.”
And to her, what is that ingredient? “I think love,” she says, instantly. “Loving what you do and putting love into it is the most important thing.” Is that a one-stop solution? “Well, it certainly is a great starting point,” she says.
