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Cho-Liang Lin: Youthful Taiwanese Violinist Takes the World
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13930 |
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Section : |
THE ARTS
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| Issue
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2 / 1988 |
2,385 Words |
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Leslie Rubinstein
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"I'm forced to speak English in Chinatown," says 27-year-old violinist Cho-Liang ("Jimmy") Lin. "My parents didn't want to corrupt my accent in Mandarin, so they refused to teach me Cantonese. I even have trouble in Hong Kong." Only in the People's Republic of China is no translation necessary, observes Lin, the only Taiwanese musician ever invited to the communist mainland. "The trouble is," he continues, "once I'm there, they never leave me alone. They 'squeeze me dry,' as the saying goes, sixteen hours a day."
Lin's home in Manhattan is a sunny, cluttered Riverside Drive bachelor apartment with a decidedly transient quality to it. A microwave oven, a killer whale poster, and a James Beard cookbook vie with hundreds of CDs ranging from Respighi's The Pines of Rome to the rock group Weather Report to jazz trumpeter Quincy Jones. Present as well in one corner is his 1707 Stradivarius. This is the instrument with which Samuel Dushkin premiered all of Stravinsky's violin works, and, according to Dushkin's widow, "it couldn't be in better hands."
Lin, whose parents emigrated to Taiwan from China soon after the communist victory in 1949, is not only an international phenomenon, but enjoys a following normally accorded only to rock stars. He has played with over 80 major orchestras; he gives over 120 concerts a year around the globe, reputedly earning some $7,500 per concert. What's more, he has won the esteem of the classical music establishment presided over by Isaac Stern. Indeed, Lin and Stern and the extraordinary cellist Yo-Yo Ma regularly play chamber music with one another; in the 1986-87 season, the three musicians performed together in Tokyo at the opening of the Suntory Festival. Several years ago, when Stern celebrated his sixtieth birthday at Carnegie Hall, Lin was one of a select few asked to perform. "The beauty of Jimmy's tone," says Stern, "is matched only by the warmth of his smile."
Lin's calendar, set five years in advance, finds him this March taking part in a cross-country tour with the highly touted young conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen and the Swedish Radio Orchestra. Their fourteen-city tour includes New York, Chicago, Miami, Detroit, and Washington, D.C. Lin is currently recording two works with Salonen--the Sibelius Concerto with the Philharmonia Orchestra and the Nielsen Concerto with the Swedish Radio Orchestra.
This month, CBS is releasing the second in its series of the complete Mozart violin concertos with Cho-Liang Lin as soloist and Raymond Leppard conducting the English Chamber Orchestra. Featured are the Concerto No. 1 in B-flat, K. 207, coupled with the Concerto No.4 in D, K. 218. Last fall's release, the Concerto No. 5 in A, K. 219, and the Concerto No.3 in G, K. 216, was awarded Stereo Review's "Best of the Month" plaudit in the December 1987 issue.
Gorgeous, Pure Tone
What makes Lin so special? "Everything," says Stereo Review's Richard Freed, "the most gorgeous, pure tone, an unfailing sense of style, grace, flair and obvious joy in making music. His tone production alone, rich and even throughout the entire range, would command admiration and envy. Here is a musician equipped not only with prodigious skill but with exceptional maturity." Freed cited Lin's recording of the familiar Mendelssohn Concerto and the Saint-Saens Concerto No. 3 with the Philharmonia Orchestra
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