Margaret Leng Tan (piano)
THROUGH THE SILENCE
Cage retrospective
In THROUGH THE SILENCE the celebrated pianist, Margaret Leng Tan, pays homage to her mentor John Cage in a retrospective performance on piano, prepared piano and toy piano. Hailed by The New Yorker as the "diva of avant-garde pianism", Margaret Leng Tan has secured a towering reputation as a consummate interpreter of new American and Asian piano music. Her performances are characterized by her radically individual style fusing sound, choreography and theater.
The preeminent interpreter of John Cage's music, Ms. Tan was with the composer the day before his death discussing the performance of a work he had written for her. In Through the Silence spanning four decades, she performs nine compositions highlighting the diversity of Cage's oeuvre. Included are 4’33”, his legendary silent piece, the theatrical Water Music, his ground-breaking Bacchanale in which he invented the prepared piano. Ms. Tan will also present the Netherlands premiere of Cage’s ‘score-painting’, Chess Pieces, which she transcribed from the art work itself, the whimsical Suite for Toy Piano, as well as an Etude Australes derived from star maps. There will be a rare opportunity to experience 0’00” (the performance piece Cage made for Yoko Ono), Dream, in Ms. Tan’s arrangement for toy piano and piano, and In the Name of the Holocaust for prepared string piano.
Duration: 90 minutes with intermission
Photos: Michael Dames
