Fire & Ice: a piano & cello concert by Van-Anh Nguyen & Yoshika Masuda

To every Yin there is a Yang. Two consummate musicians join forces to present an intimate warehouse concert, performing passionate works of Rachmaninoff & Piazzolla through to the icy stillness compositions of Arvo Part & Max Richter and more.

Van-Anh and Yoshika have shared the stages together for over 2 decades, first both starting off performing in high school in Sydney before both moving overseas to study and now both calling Los Angeles home for much of their life.

Program:

Von Paradis: Sicilienne

Arvo Part: Spiegel Im Spiegel

Rachmaninoff: Sonata in G minor Op. 19 (3rd movement)

Max Richter: In The Nature Of Daylight

Piazzolla: Le Grand Tango

Amy Beach: Romance

Edith Piaf: La Vie En Rose

Ennio Morricone: Cinema Paradiso

Hans Zimmer: selections of Hans Zimmer works arranged for piano & cello

More to be announced

About Van-Anh

ARIA nominated concert pianist and Universal/Decca/Deutsche Grammophon recording artist Van-Anh Nguyen is a worldwide sensation and in-demand artist. She has had several ARIA & iTunes chart toppers and became the first Australian-Vietnamese to ever in history enter the US iTunes Classical Charts.

Born to Vietnamese refugee musicians and having started piano studies at the tender age of 13 months old, Australian born concert pianist gave her Sydney Opera House debut at age 8.

Her bubbly contagious personality and emotive playing has graced the stages as a soloist across Australia at venues including the Sydney Opera House, City Recital Hall, the Forbidden City Concert Hall (China), the Shanghai Oriental Arts Centre (China), Segerstrom Performing Arts Center (LA), Herbst Theater (SF). She regularly guests with the Ho Chi Minh City Symphony Orchestra (HCMC, Vietnam) and Vietnamese American Philharmonic Orchestra (California, USA).

Her ability to perform classically as well as have the stage flair for creative classical-crossover arranging and mash ups has allowed her to perform for such brands as Cartier, Moet & Chandon, Tiffany & Co, Porsche, Barons de Rothschild, the Patron Secret Society, Fairfax & Roberts, Vicki Lee Gallery, Ferrari to name a few.

Van-Anh currently has 10 albums released on all major digital music outlets with her most recent release on Deutsche Grammophon. Van-Anh has been featured across various publications including L’Officiel Magazine, Elle Magazine Vietnam, Sunday Life, Marie Claire Australia and Harper’s Bazaar Magazine as a music icon and she has had her own TV show on Discovery Channel Asia.

Her versatility as a pianist allows her to collaborate across genres, having toured and performed with internet sensations TwoSet Violin, soul singer Ronee Martin (Quarter Finalist America’s Got Talent 2016, backup singer for Patti La Belle), classical violinist Filip Pogady, Reigan Derry (Sony Music Australia, ARIA Platinum Artist) through to being a recording solo pianist for various composers as well as writing for other artists.

She is also one half of Double Touch, a melodic house duo blending live instrumentation with electronic beats. They are signed to All Day I Dream and have performed across the globe at Brooklyn Mirage (NYC), Scorpios (Mykonos), Cova Santa (Ibiza), OMNIA (Bali, Indonesia), Return to Rio Festival (NSW, Australia), San Francisco Golden Gate Park (SF, USA) and have released on labels including All Day I Dream, TrybesOf, Buddha Bar and Ministry of Sound.

Van-Anh is the creator and owner of Perfect Pairings, a concert concept where she pairs music to wine. This concept has appeared across 6 countries, working with various vineyards, sommeliers and chefs and has subsequently led to her, launching her own wine.

Van-Anh is a Roland Artist & Ambassador. She now resides between Sydney and Los Angeles. For more information, please see www.vananhofficial.com

About Yoshika

Described by the press as "a remarkable 'cellist who possesses both intellect and innate musicality... one of the finest cellists of his generation" (Chopin magazine Japan), Japanese 'cellist YOSHIKA MASUDA has performed throughout Australia, Japan, China, Mexico, the USA, the UK and much of western Europe as a soloist and chamber musician. He is the winner of national competitions in Australia, Japan and the US, and was also awarded the prestigious YAMAHA Music Foundation of Europe String Award.

Chamber music forms the core of Yoshika’s musical endeavours, and he has performed alongside Peter Frankl, Bruno Giuranna, Gil Kalish, Cho-Liang Lin, Alissa Margulis, Roger Tapping, Don Weilerstein and Qian Zhou. He is the co-founder of the SAKURA cello quintet and resident cellist for Salastina LA, and was also the former cellist of the award-winning Rolston Quartet with whom he toured Canada and Europe. Yoshika has performed at the festivals of Aldeburgh and Leicester in the UK, Festival Amfiteatrof in Italy, Kirishima Music Festival in Japan, and the Yellow Barn Music Festival and Piatigorsky International Cello Festival in the USA. His performances were broadcast widely on ABC Classic FM (Australia), BBC Radio 3 (UK), Musiq’3 (Belgium), Klassik Radio (Germany), KUSC (USA) and Concertzender Radio (The Netherlands).

A keen advocate of contemporary music, Yoshika has given the US & world premieres of works by Reena Esmail, Toshio Hosokawa, Derrick Skye, Bent Sørensen, Nick Strimple and Jörg Widmann.

Yoshika demonstrates a strong commitment to community engagement by frequently collaborating with Street Symphony, an organisation that utilises music to foster human connections within homeless and incarcerated communities, with a particular focus on downtown Los Angeles' Skid Row.

​His interests outside of the classical genre have led him to perform with artists such as Ben Folds at the Sydney Opera House and Pink Martini at the Hollywood Bowl. Yoshika is also featured on Leonard Cohen's last album 'You Want It Darker', which was released in October 2016 on Columbia Records.

Born in Kobe, Japan, Yoshika first started playing the cello at the age of five but moved to Australia as a young child where he began his studies with Georg Pedersen at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. He then studied extensively with Hannah Roberts and Ralph Kirshbaum, whilst also receiving close musical guidance from Thomas Demenga and David Geringas. Yoshika graduated from the Royal Northern College of Music in the UK with distinction and received the Principal’s Prize along with the Leonard Rose Cello Award for outstanding achievement. He gained his D.M.A. from the USC Thornton School of Music.

Yoshika is dedicated to nurturing the next generation of young cellists - his students have had successes in both local and national competitions, as well as being admitted to prestigious institutions such as Juilliard, NEC, MSM, and USC. Yoshika is currently the Assistant Professor of 'cello and Director of String Studies at Chapman University Hall-Musco Conservatory of Music. He has also served on the summer faculty of the Montecito International Music Festival, Heartland Chamber Music Festival and the Yellow Barn Young Artist Program.

Length of concert: 70 minutes with 15 minutes interval

Non-alcoholic beverages will be available for purchase before and after the show as well as during intermission.