Kyung-Wha Chung
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Kyung-Wha Chung born in Seoul, South Korea in 1948) is a Korean violinist.
A pioneer in the Asian classical music circuit, Kyung-Wha Chung's musical career began at the age of two. Her fame peaked in the seventies and eighties along with other famous violinists such as Pinchas Zukerman and Itzhak Perlman. In her prime, she was well known for her interpretations of Romantic and Modern music. After devoting many years to her family, she is currently working on music from the Classical and Baroque periods.
Early Years
Kyung-Wha Chung was born in March 26th, 1948 in Seoul, South Korea, to a very musical family. Her mother recognised her musical talent from a young age (she began to sing at the age of two). With her perfect pitch, Chung was a good singer winning several small competitions. Upon this success she was introduced to the piano. However, the instrument bored her so much that she often fell asleep while practicing. However the moment she first heard the sound of a violin, she was instantly mesmerized by its tone. With an amazing amount of focus and a surprising speed of learning for one so young, Kyung-Wha Chung began to play the violin from the age of seven. She was known as a child prodigy, and at age nine she was already playing the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra. As time progressed she steadily won most of the famous music competitions in Korea. Chung and her siblings toured around the country, performing music both as soloists and as a chamber orchestra. As the children became more and more famous in Korea, Chung's mother felt that it was too small a country for her children to further their musical careers. So she decided to move to America. All of Chung's siblings played classical instruments and three of them became professional musicians. Her younger brother, Myung-Whun Chung is a conductor and a pianist who won second prize in Tchaikovsky Competition against Andrei Gavrilov. Her older sister, Myung Wha Chung, who plays cello, and studied with the great Gregor Piatigorsky, has won many competitions and currently teaches in Korea.America
At age thirteen she arrived in the United States. However, Chung's family found that moving to America was not to be an easy undertaking. With the help of Myung-Soh, her older flutist sister who was studying at the Juilliard School, Chung received an invitation to audition for Pre-College division of the Juilliard. The audition was successful, Chung was awarded a full scholarship to the Juilliard and the possibility to study under the renowned pedagogue Ivan Galamian.Julliard
Studying in Juilliard was not easy. The language barrier was huge and being a part of a minority racial group meant that Chung often felt an outsider. She was one of the best child violinists in Korea, but at the Juilliard, competing against some of the best young prodigies in world, Chung found that her talent was significantly less than she had been led to believe. She was shocked that Itzhak Perlman, another protégé of Galamian, had a wider repertoire than she did.Faced with these challenges she determined to distinguish herself, working so hard that her family began to fear for her health. Galamian’s training was very strict, renowned for causing students to leave the school. However, for Chung's work-ethic, it seemed that his technique was exactly what she needed. Her playing matured considerably during this time period with the help of her teacher. Galamian, however, was known to be prejudiced against female violinists. Although he knew of her talent, he thought she could go only so far as a professional violinist. He always warned her not to marry. This kind of prejudice only caused her to practice more. She wanted to prove to him and everyone that she could do both; marry and have a family, and also have a successful career. Subsequently, she did both.
Career
Chung always wished to compete in Tchaikovsky Competition, but because of the cold war and the tense relationship between the Soviet Union and South Korea, she could not participate. So instead in 1967, she decided to participate in the Edgar Leventritt Competition, a prestigious competition in which Itzhak Perlman won first prize. However, many around her tried to dissuade her from participating. Her manager thought that if she did not win, it would be very detrimental to her career.Her teacher Ivan Galamian was also not in favor of this because Pinchas Zukerman, another of his students, was participating in the same competition. Because he was being supported by the famous and very powerful Isaac Stern, Zukerman seemed to have better chance of winning the competition. But to boost her confidence, Chung's determined mother sold the family house in Korea to buy her a Stradivarius violin.In the final stage of the competition, the judges found it impossible to decide a winner between Chung and Zukerman, and Isaac Stern demanded that they play again. Yet even after the second time, the judges still could not decide, and for the first time in the history of the Leventritt competition, it had two winners; Chung and Zukerman both won first place. After the competition, Chung said she felt 'liberated'. Kyung-Wha had concerts with major American Orchestras such as Chicago Symphony and New York Philharmonic and substituted for Milstein for his White House Gala when he became indisposed. However, her career was still not blossoming. Her chance came in 1970, when Itzhak Perlman could not come to London for his concert with the London Symphony Orchestra (his wife was giving birth to their child), and Chung was asked to step in at the last minute. The orchestra was initially very hostile to Chung, who they considered an “amateur”. The orchestra started playing the Mendelssohn Violin concerto during the rehearsal when Chung was told that she will be playing Tchaikovsky for the concert. However, she played the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto perfectly, after which she won the respect of all the orchestra. The rehearsal went smoothly afterwardsw and the concert was a huge success. The success in London meant a lot to her career; she had many engagements in England and she subsequently had an exclusive recording deal with Decca/London. Her debut album with Andre Previn and LSO which included the Tchaikovsky concerto coupled with the Sibelius concerto brought her to the international stage. The Tchaikovsky concerto recording is still regarded as a reference and her Sibelius violin concerto is still compared by the critics whenever new Sibelius recordings are released. Both her European Debut and recording deal was commercially and musically a huge success and her career now started to bloom. Since then she has performed around the world, most of the time with a huge critical acclaim. She has worked with most major orchestras including the Berlin Philharmonic, Vienna Philharmonic, London Symphony Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Chicago Symphony, Boston Symphony and she worked with many famous conductors like Sir Georg Solti, Andre Previn, Simon Rattle, Claudio Abbado, Charles Dutoit and Riccardo Muti. She has also worked with many celebrated pianists such as Radu Lupu, Krystian Zimerman, Peter Frankl, Stephen Kovacevich and her younger brother Myung Whun Chung. Her repertoire includes most of the famous concertos ranging from Beethoven to Tchaikovksy to Berg, and she has recorded many sonatas such as Brahms Violin Sonatas, Respighi & Strauss Violin sonatas (with Krystian Zimerman, and which earned her the prestigious Gramophone Award for Best Chamber Recording). Her interpretations are known to be very passionate but at the same well structured and with a lot of tonal variations. Her early recordings show an astonishing degree of perfectionism towards which Chung pursued.
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