A day with Yuja Wang II: Verbier Festival Essentials

Get ready to hit the ground running when you press play, as our Yuja compilation kicks off with her star-making rendition of Rimsky-Korsakov's Flight of the Bumblebee (in György Cziffra's diabolical transcription, playable only by the best of the best). Next up is another notoriously difficult transcription, Rachmaninov's arrangement of the Scherzo from Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream, executed with an astonishing lightness of touch by our virtuoso, who then proves her mettle yet again in Ravel's complex and playful La Valse.

This dynamite opening salvo leads gracefully into excerpts from Stravinsky's Petrushka and a slew of favorites from the concerto repertoire: Mendelssohn's Piano Concerto No. 1 (with the VFO under the great Kurt Masur), Rachmaninov's perennially beloved Second, and the extraordinary Prokofiev Third. Wang also joins forces with Leonidas Kavakos and Gautier Capuçon in a stunning Brahms Trio and makes the most challenging works by Beethoven (the monumental "Hammerklavier" Sonata) and Ravel ("Scarbo" from Gaspard de la nuit) sound exquisite and look effortless. The exhilarating program concludes with two piano duets for the ages as Yuja teams up with András Schiff for spirited Slavonic Dances by Dvořák and with Denis Kozhukhin for the grand finale, Lutosławski's jaw-dropping Paganini Variations for Two Pianos.

Yuja Wang appears courtesy of Deutsche Grammophon.

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