The hall remained quiet and still even as Lee Dohui climbed onto the stage and sat down at the piano.
Every member of the audience was holding their breath with utmost care.
‘Do idol fans have better etiquette than I thought? They could at least applaud a little.’
After gazing steadily at the keys before her for about five seconds, Lee Dohui smiled and gently placed her right hand on them.
At that sight, pianist Jeong Hanbin marveled inwardly.
‘...Excellent. Her expressive attitude.’
Unlike the previous contestants, who had merely acted out and imitated expressions.
Lee Dohui was already carrying her emotions maturely before the performance even began.
Not simply sadness, but a faint smile.
The corners of her lips trembling little by little, as though she could not contain her sorrow.
‘...Then what about her playing? Will her attitude and expressiveness in performance be good as well...!’
Together with Jeong Hanbin’s expectations, Chopin’s Ballade No. 4, Op. 52 began.
It opened with the presentation of three G octaves, as if expressing that indescribably faint smile.
A beginning that seemed empty unless one listened closely, brushing ever so lightly against the ear.
Then Lee Dohui’s left hand settled down softly.
Sol, sol, sol—without breaking that gentle flutter.
A voice clearly distinguished from the right hand, warm C major harmonies filled the space.
An image naturally arose, as though one were looking at stars appearing of their own accord, or listening to a song from the heavens.
‘The beginning... is certainly distinctly different from the other contestants.’
Of course, it was still too early to give an evaluation.
This opening was a standardized formula already established by pianists.
‘What matters is...’
Before long, the C rang out with an accent.
The progression in C major changed to F minor.
At last, the theme of Chopin’s Ballade No. 4 had begun.
It was time for the plaintive melody that instantly drew one into Chopin’s sensibility to flow.
A very elegant, delicate emotional line.
A restrained sense of solitude rather than violent sorrow.
‘Lee Dohui, how will you express this?’
At that moment, Lee Dohui’s head began to sway.
And the way the sound carried changed.
Restrained emotions spread all the way to the far end of the hall.
Jeong Hanbin knew exactly why.
Lee Dohui’s perception had changed.
From a narrow space, from the piano right in front of her, to this vast hall.
The proof was Lee Dohui, gazing into the distance.
Surprisingly, sound interacted a great deal with the performer’s gaze.
It created the expression of emotion.
And when one looked far away, it gave the illusion that the touch, the phrase, the wavelength all grew longer.
‘It isn’t an illusion. Her touch really did change.’
In other words, her current playing meant that Lee Dohui knew precisely.
That this was not simply playing alone in a cramped practice room of two or three pyeong, lined with soundproofing walls.
That she was performing in a hall capable of seating five hundred people.
Ordinarily, students had no such awareness at all.
They had few chances to play in a place this large, and little room to spare mentally.
But Lee Dohui.
‘They said she was an idol.’
Five hundred people? She must have performed in front of thousands.
Perhaps even tens of thousands.
Since they said she was popular.
With a performance that had not yet passed even one minute.
With a performance that still had ten minutes remaining.
Though it was a little early, Jeong Hanbin began assigning scores.
First, the technical portion.
Beat, rhythm, pedaling.
‘As long as there isn’t some enormous mistake, she’s the definite first place.’
They were all one hundred points.
But there was still a category Jeong Hanbin could not score.
Attitude and phrasing.
Those two criteria varied greatly depending on how one had studied and interpreted the piece.
In truth, there was one fact Jeong Hanbin was missing here.
That Dohui was a high school division contestant.
And Jeong Hanbin did not look at how high school division contestants studied and interpreted a piece.
Because he assumed it was their teacher’s guidance anyway.
Instead, he only looked at the performer’s facial expression, where they lifted their arms, and the gestures of their hands.
In other words, Dohui was the first in the history of the high school division for whom Jeong Hanbin demanded study and interpretation as evaluation criteria.
Because Dohui’s initial expression, her expression at the keyboard, and her handling of her gaze were flawlessly professional.
‘But... at this level, it means nothing.’
Because this, too, was that of a standardized professional.
‘If you really are a genius...’
He wanted her to show something of her own.
Not something she had learned from someone after repeating the piece countless times.
He wanted her to show something uniquely hers.
‘Right, it’s still the beginning...’
The performance had not even passed the middle section yet.
Naturally, the highlight of Chopin’s Ballade No. 4 was in the latter half.
As it drew closer to the coda, the closing phrase, the individual’s expression, interpretation, and study would be contained within it.
How that part was interpreted, how it was played, how it was connected.
‘If you really are a genius... your expression...’
Sweat began to form in Jeong Hanbin’s hands.
* * *
Ballade No. 4 is a piece overflowing with Chopin’s maturity.
Because Chopin, who died young at the age of thirty-nine, composed it when he was already fairly advanced in years.
That was why there were many new concepts in this piece.
─♬♪♫
For instance, like the countless chromatic notes being played now.
That was why this piece, which was extremely complex both technically and musically, could not help but be difficult to express with the theme that pierced through the entire performance: a restrained sense of solitude.
That was the reason Ballade No. 4 was chosen as one of Chopin’s greatest pieces, and the reason performers’ interpretations split into countless branches.
Some masters would occasionally let notes slip by as they played.
They did not play them precisely.
And yet they made it sound as if they played magnificently.
Some masters did not adhere to Chopin’s distinctive thin yet clear and elegant touch.
There were even cases where they played that restrained solitude clearly and intensely instead.
But I was not one of those masters.
Nor did I intend to choose one of their performances and imitate it.
Like a student, I was playing in an extremely standardized way.
Following the score, obeying everything, singing everything.
It was not for the sake of earning points at this stage.
It was not for the sake of winning the grand prize.
This was my interpretation.
Emotions built up one by one, step by step.
A sense of solitude restrained and restrained again.
This standardized performance was a staircase.
My expression, my gaze, were merely tools.
A method for driving all my emotions to their utmost extreme.
And for the moment when they would burst.
And in that process.
The middle section now played a very large role.
When I played this part, Bach often came to mind.
Imitative counterpoint—it greatly resembled Bach’s fugues.
Among Chopin’s pieces, the one that could be said to resemble a fugue.
Was probably only this Ballade No. 4.
Though Chopin often immersed himself in Bach’s music.
He had never once been strict about contrapuntal form.
Of course, that did not mean this piece now had a clear contrapuntal form either.
But its scent was certainly there.
The scent of homophonic counterpoint.
That was probably Chopin’s own method.
Pastoral and calm.
In other words, a way of returning to restrained Baroque music.
Because Chopin was a genius.
But it is difficult to find signs of an explosion in restrained Baroque music.
How could one expect an explosion from Baroque music, where restrained forms were born?
It was a contradiction.
But it was not a contradiction.
Rather, it was possible precisely because my interpretation contained the Baroque.
It was the public’s misconception that Baroque music was calm and dull.
To begin with, the Portuguese word barroco meant “misshapen pearl.”
It meant something so ornate that it had become distorted.
To that extent, the pieces of the Baroque era were ornate, dazzling works that had broken away from religious music.
Even if they were written calmly on the score, they were ornate, dazzling works.
One could tell simply from how active piano battles were during the Baroque era.
What is a good pianist?
Today, it is about who interprets the score well, who has good technique.
But a pianist of Baroque music?
It is about who plays more splendidly.
The piano battles of the Baroque era went like this.
First, the performer played the piece once according to the score in a standardized way.
Then the performer returned to the beginning and played it once again.
But the second performance was completely different from the first.
Because it had been adorned with abundant grace notes and added with improvised trills.
That was Baroque music.
It meant playing freely according to the performer’s individuality.
So I, too, intended to play the piece in my own way.
And now, in the latter half, before the coda.
The pianissimo was the beginning.
Like Chopin, who added the scent of Baroque in a beautiful way.
Like Chopin, who sought to return to the beginning.
I, too, with a simple variation rather than an extreme arrangement.
Intended only to add the scent of Baroque.
Back to the purely joyful beginning.
* * *
Jeong Hanbin could not help feeling a little disappointed.
Her performance skill and her independent atmosphere were certainly not those of a high school student.
But she had failed to break free from the fixed frame.
It meant there was no new interpretation in her performance.
‘Well, if she interpreted this piece anew... that would be international competition level.’
Still, what should be acknowledged had to be acknowledged.
At seventeen years old, with that level of performance, she would rank near the top even in the university division.
‘First place is yours.’
Feeling bored, Jeong Hanbin picked up his ballpoint pen and wrote an overall score of 100 on the scoring sheet.
There was no need to go all the way to the closing phrase, to the coda.
The eight minutes of playing, which had been far too conventional.
Made him predict the ending.
Jeong Hanbin leaned back against his chair.
The female professor beside him was still watching with a smile, but.
It seemed his own expectations had been too high after all.
‘Now... about two minutes left. D-flat major. The pianissimo part.’
At that moment, Lee Dohui’s playing changed unmistakably.
“Huh?”
It was not a matter of her expression, touch, or gaze changing.
The piece itself had changed.
The beat had slowed slightly.
The score only marked pianissimo, very softly.
There was no rallentando, no instruction to gradually slow down.
Yet she had altered the tempo as she pleased.
Judging from what Lee Dohui had played so far, it could not have been a mistake.
Even the difficult pedaling had fallen perfectly into place.
Originally, this part before the coda, which began in pianissimo, had to give the feeling of building up emotions and then bursting them open.
‘In other words, an emotional climax.’
But Lee Dohui’s slowed tempo gave the impression of holding restrained emotions even deeper within, enduring them to the very end.
‘Even so, she’ll have to let them burst at least once right before the coda.’
But there was still no sign of that.
Lee Dohui was striking the keys softly and comfortably.
Even though she clearly should have been pressing them firmly and powerfully.
Even though the emotions she had restrained should have burst forth as though吐ing out the truth.
The progression, made slow from the beginning, instead emphasized the pure beauty of the progression itself.
But the compulsion that she should press powerfully, that she should let it burst, swallowed his mind.
Then Lee Dohui began striking the keys strongly.
But it was not refreshing at all.
Because the strong strikes had come too late, lasting only a few measures.
But precisely because of that, the coda became all the more anticipated.
The process in which the restrained emotions that had not been released would erupt passionately in the coda, as if exploding.
And the new softness announcing the beginning of the coda came through.
—Again, pianissimo.
That softness was so contrasting that it felt as though one had fallen into another world.
But only for a moment. In the end, the coda began.
Lee Dohui’s fingers struck the keys intensely, and the passions of all the emotions accumulated until then were laid bare.
At that moment, Lee Dohui’s expression was filled with a sharp smile, as though dyed with excitement and passion.
At times, it even seemed as if tears had welled in her eyes.
That emotional impact passed straight through my ears and rang in my head, making it feel as though I were experiencing the passion directly.
Then, when she swept down the keys softly and organically, the emotions surged.
And at last, when only the powerful keystrokes remained, when she hammered down on the piano as if driving them into it.
—Clap, clap.
Only a lingering catharsis remained.
Without realizing it, he rose from his seat and applauded.
Following him, applause came from the audience as well.
Of course, the professor beside him was looking strangely at Jeong Hanbin, who had given a standing ovation.
But none of that mattered.
Even as he clapped, Jeong Hanbin thought back to the final instant.
As though blinded by emotional fury, as though seeking to unleash everything.
The final additional strike, ignoring the harmony and pressing down every key with the fingers that remained.
The progression built up for the sake of that final strike was the finest interpretation Lee Dohui had shown.
* * *
‘Ah, fuck. My fingers went numb, so I pressed the wrong thing at the end.’