Yuja Wang THE BERLIN RECITAL ENCORES

Yuja Wang is one of those exceedingly rare pianists to have become a major international presence by her 21st birthday. Having performed by then with such orchestras as the New York, St. Petersburg, and China philharmonics, and the Chicago, San Francisco, and Houston symphony orchestras, she transitioned almost overnight from an unknown but hugely talented teenager to arguably the most famous Chinese-born female pianist. And with a multi-disc recording contract with DG and a schedule of more than 100 concerts yearly, she is one of the busiest on the globe, as well. While she has had success in competitions, Wang owes her sudden fame mostly to her role as a fill-in for superstar pianists who cancel on short notice. Most famously, Wang substituted for Martha Argerich in the Tchaikovsky First with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in March 2007. The reviewers were ecstatic in their praise for her performance. The following year she substituted for Murray Perahia on a concert tour that garnered lavish critical acclaim from Boston to San Francisco. Wang's repertory is broad and quite eclectic, taking in works by Mozart, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Chopin, Scriabin, Rachmaninov, Prokofiev, and others.