By Emma Stanton, Staff Writer
The West Windsor Music Festival, created and directed by renowned pianist Sakiko Ohashi, will be returning this month for its fourth annual event. This concert series will feature a collection of solo and duet concertos by Jazz improvisationalist and classical pianist Nick Sanders. He will be joined by acclaimed viola and violinist Amadi Azikiwe and decorated violinist Joanna Maurer. These musicians will share the stage with Ohashi, bathing West Windsor in the serenades of Bach, Shostakovich, and Debussy, to name a few.
A few years ago, Ohashi stumbled on the West Windsor venue while on a trip with her husband. She told the Standard, “It was very surreal, we walked around the town hall building, and there we found a small townhouse, and thought this would be a perfect venue for a concert event. The process of putting the show together that first year happened quickly and organically. It was such an amazing experience. The people in Vermont are so receptive and warm; it became the perfect environment to share this kind of music.”
Ohashi, a native Japanese pianist, began her classical music studies at age four. By 10, she was accepted to the Julliard Pre-College Division of Herbert Stessin. Ohashi has since gone on to complete a Bachelor and Master’s in Music from Julliard, performing on various stages across the United States such as Lincoln Center, Carnegie Weill Recital Hall, Julliard Theater, and The Harvard Club, as well as performing internationally in Japan, Canada, and Europe.
She will begin the West Windsor Music Festival on stage with Nick Sanders, her former student.
“I knew I wanted to play a four-hand piece with Nick, and Bach is where it starts,” Ohashi told the Standard. “Bach is a god to classical pianists, and so it felt right to begin with his work. I’ll then move onto Chopin, where I’ll play a Chopin solo polonaise-fantaisie and then reunite with Nick for a Gottshalk four-hands piece. This will be very special for us since Gottshalk is a New Orleans composer and that is where Nick and I first met many years ago.”
Growing up in New Orleans, Sanders began playing piano at the age of seven. Exposed to the beauty of classical music at a young age by his mother, his love for the art only grew after her untimely passing in his early teen years. “My mother was always playing music around the house. It was an art instilled in me from a very young age,” Sanders told the Standard. “I attended the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts when I was fourteen and specialized in classical music for the first two years. That is where I met Sakiko.” Sanders later transitioned into jazz-style compositions and eventually began composing his own work and perfecting the art of improvisation. “It feels so freeing to sit down at the piano, place your hands on the keys, and have no idea what will come next. You have to be simultaneously thinking ten steps ahead, but also settle into the discomfort of the unknown, and trust that your hands will lead you in the right direction. It is a rigorous and completely invigorating experience.”
Sanders, who has recently begun dabbling in the improvisation of classical style music, plans to perform his own compositions in addition to his duets with Ohashi. “Improvising in a jazz setting feels a little easier; you can lean on the other instruments for guidance. The heart of jazz music lends itself well to improvisation. On the other hand, classical music is more formally structured; students can become deeply fixated on not playing the wrong notes or straying from the original,” he said. “I like to exist in the space between the written notes and the emotionality of the piece. I think when you truly know a piece, and can burrow deep inside of it, there is room for play and experimentation. This happens when you are completely in the present with a piece of music and is something I’ve been striving to achieve for several years.”
Sanders will join Ohashi on stage on Friday evening for the opening concert, and again on Saturday morning for “A Little Jazz, A Little Fun” event directed towards children.
Ohashi went on to speak about the process of choosing the specific pieces she will be playing with Sanders, and the feelings they evoke in her when performed. “There are so many different emotions and sentiments attached to Bach and Chopin. For the latter, his love for country, a country he could never return to, radiates through his music. I feel very connected to this feeling. I am a person who, like Chopin, has two homes. I have lived in America for a very long time, but I am Japanese and still have very strong roots to Japan. I can always go back, but there are many people around me who can no longer return to their homeland, and that isolation permeates throughout spaces I inhabit. Not only is this feeling embedded in Chopin’s music, but I also find his work to be harmonious, intimate, and some of the most layered piano music I have ever had the pleasure of performing.”
In West Windsor, Ohashi will also be performing with renowned violist Amadi Azikiwe on Saturday, June 28. Azikiwe, who began studying classical music at a young age, has gone on to master four instruments – the piano, the cello, the violin, and the viola. A graduate of the New England Conservatory, he performs around the world.
Ohashi continued, “I find the viola to be one of the richest and under-represented instruments. I always try to include a viola or cello solo in my festival, and this year, partnering with Amadi just felt right. We will be playing the Shostakovich Sonata, which is another extremely heavy piece. He was a Soviet-era composer, who survived the most uninhabitable circumstances yet continued to create and turn his hardship into something beautiful. His work has so much personality; it’s heady, but at the same time light and humorous. I remember growing up at the height of the Cold War and discovering his music and feeling a deep sense of hope. He captured the resiliency of the human existence, and this feeling I remember tucking away inside of myself and harnessing as I progressed on the piano.” Azikiwe and Ohashi will also be performing the lighthearted dance-songs of Marais. “We want the audience to feel the full range of human emotion during the festival,” Ohashi continued. “It’s important for us to create balance. Some of these pieces can be extremely heavy, but many concertos also hold within them a great brevity and hopefulness. I hope to move the audience from tears of sadness to tears of joy.”
Azikiwe echoed this sentiment, stating, “The pieces we have chosen offer a deep emotional satisfaction to both audience and performers. There is so much pain in Shostakovich, so much resistance and rebellion. Marais, on the other hand, was an artist I have loved for years but could not find an adequate translation of his work for viola. So, I learned how to play him myself. I was tired of depriving the viola the chance for such a playful tune.”
To end this festival, Ohashi will be joined on stage with renowned violinist Joanna Maurer, where they will play two pieces. Born and raised in Colorado, Maurer has performed as orchestral soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician throughout the United States, as well as in Germany, Austria, and the Czech Republic. After initial studies with her parents, she received her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees at the Juilliard School. Having been friends with Ohashi for twenty years, she told the Standard, “It was a joy to reunite with my friend in this way. My favorite performances have always been communal; music demands a shared space.”
Ohashi continued, “I wanted to bring my Japanese culture into this festival and found a series of short pieces by American composer Steven Hartke, who created a grouping inspired by netsuke, the Japanese art form of creating small, intricate statues. It was very interesting for me to see the fusion of culture and art collide, and I begged Joanna to learn these small vignettes and play them with me. In return I let her choose the final piece for the festival, and so we will be ending with the Tzigane by Ravel. It’s a very optimistic piece that celebrates the aesthetic beauty of music — the perfect ending note for our concert.”
For Ohashi, playing piano feels like surrendering to a greater force. “Music speaks through me,” she told the Standard, “It is a culmination of all that has come before me, colliding and intermingling with my own felt experience, to create something greater and more profound than I could ever express with words. It is the most profound and intimate art form, and to be able to share it with the residents of Vermont, to partake in this with friends and musicians I love so dearly, it’s such a special and important event.”