Tarin Plays “Hummingbird” (Name of Bosendorfer Piano Used)

Thai pianist Tarin Supprakorn following his successful Bangkok recital.

Siam Music Yamaha Concert Salon.  Bangkok, Thailand.  July 6, 2013.  There are a small, but not tiny, number of highly talented Thai piano students whom I’ve been following since their early teenage years.  It was easy for me to do this because there are many opportunities for them to play in public in local competitions, festivals, and events sponsored by their teachers and others, which gives them an early chance to get used to practicing for and performing in front of the public, as well as affording me the chance to listen to many hours of music from young souls, absent the concern of a parent.  These successful budding pianists have followed more or less the same path to their current ages of about 22:  thorough study with one of Bangkok’s very good teachers, a transfer to Singapore’s excellent music conservatory, which has a connection with Peabody Conservatory, and then on to Europe or the United States to become degree candidates in some of the world’s best music schools, e.g., Eastman, Peabody, RCM.  But of course, the vagaries of growing up (and life itself) are such that one can never predict how any teenager will turn out. 

Well, when it comes to Tarin Supprakorn, whom I first heard play when he was about 14, the evidence is in:  he’s terrific.  At age 22, in Bangkok on July 6, Tarin presented a recital program which would have been the envy of many professional pianists.  He declined to play anything easy---the Bach and Mozart are not exceptions---and structured his recital to reflect some of the major components of classical piano playing: baroque (Fantasia and Fugue in A minor of Bach); classical (Sonata No. 9 by Mozart), 20^th century impressionism (Debussy etudes), and romanticism (Schumann’s Carnaval).  Tarin showed not only that he can play anything he wants to play, but also that he plays everything well.

When I studied plane geometry, there was an axiom I learned early on:  the whole equals the sum of its parts.  While you can’t do geometry without taking it to heart, the same axiom is a disaster in such monumental works as Schumann’s Carnaval, which is made up of 22 quite short miniatures.  The trick to playing Carnaval is to make sure that the performance equals more than the total of its 22 disparate parts.  This is known as transcendence, or simply, making beautiful music.  The look of absorption and concentration on Tarin’s face as he played this fiendishly difficult and long piece, disclosed that something very profound was going on inside, but one doesn’t have to have an x-ray to know what that was:  the depths of Schumann were being mined, nurtured, examined, loved and cherished.  It is a testament to Tarin’s artistry that he was able to communicate all of this to his listeners.  Tarin is returning to Eastman for graduate studies in piano performance.  If he keeps up like this (and I don’t doubt that he will) he will soon be teaching his teachers.