Extra Event: Richard Clayderman's Piano Recital

For my extra event, I went to Richard Clayderman’s piano recital. Although I had experiences playing piano in the past, I was never really interested in it. Not a pianist myself, I went to the recital without knowing who Clayderman is. However, I got the chance to go to the backstage and through communicating with Mr. Clayderman, I found out that he is actually a great gentleman who dedicated his life to piano and music.

(Recital Ticket)

(Picture with Richard Clayderman)

I went to the rehearsal before the actual performance and even during rehearsal, he gave his best performance and communicated with the stage director in order to deliver the best performance.

(Rehearsal)

When the recital started, the audiences were awed with his piano skill. My dad, who never had any musical experience before, was even amazed by the amount of emotions that Clayderman put into his performance. I read a fellow student’s blog post for the neuroscience week before, and in that blog, the student connected neuroscience to music. She explained how different musical notes could trigger different emotions as the audiences’ brain processes the music. I think I understood her blog more while listening to the recital. As Clayderman shifts from slow, romantic melodies to fast, edgy songs, my brain processed the music differently, allowing me to change my emotion from relaxed to tensed up. It is as if each note that pounds on his piano was activating a specific nerve in my brain, leading my heart to pound with the music as well.

Another place where I found connections to this class is through a stage prop. Clayderman’s performances were accompanied with different stories and pictures that were projected on to the screen. The area of projection was designed in a way that it delivers a 3-dimensional feel to it. This reminded me of the lesson for math and art. Technologies like this utilized not only math, but also depth perception and proportion in creating the appropriate effect. I was amazed at how well the projection turned out because when I saw it during rehearsal, the staff was still trying to adjust the projection and it was not very successful.

(Projection area during rehearsal)

(Projection area during recital)

In addition to the performances, the highlights of this recital were the interactions that Clayderman had with the audiences. He would give away his piano sheets after he finishes playing his pieces. During the recital, he even mistakenly gave away a music sheet that he has not played yet, so he had to chase after the little girl who got the sheet and ask for it back.  Clayderman also interacted with the audiences by asking them to clap along while he played his piece.

(Richard Clayderman)

The recital allowed me to get to know about an amazing pianist, Richard Clayderman. I had a lot of fun as I not only enjoyed great music, but was also entertained by Clayderman’s spontaneous jokes and mistakes. Because I never went to piano recitals before, I thought this experience was something new and exciting. I am glad that the first piano recital I went to was done by an artist as great as Clayderman.