On Friday June 20th, David and Wu Han were joined by violinist Da-Hong Seetoo for a special performance of three Beethoven trios as part of photographer and musician Christian Steiner's Tannery Pond Concerts series. The night proved to be an unusual one when the venue faced power failure and the trio decided to perform lit only by flashlights.

Da-Hong's impressions:

"It was a legendary concert that we played with flashlights. Only a few musicians, David and Wu Han and I would be crazy enough to do it. We could've easily walked away said 'Sorry folks', but we actually stayed. It is difficult to play chamber music without being able to see eachother, and certainly posed a huge challnege, but luckily we had enough rehearsals that we could rely on certain things happening without looking at eachother. We're all very grateul that it went so well. It's a difficult program to begin with that requires a great amount of concentration. Mentally it's gruelling: its long, and there are so many details in the score that you have to be very faithful to. It's not something that can be done on automatic pilot, you have to be highly concentrated on what you are doing. So when the lights went out, we kept playing. It's certainly interesting. I also have to give credit to the audience that they stayed. They couldn't' see much at all, all they saw were two or three flashlights pointing at the music stands; they certainly couldn't see us. For them to stay, not a single soul left, goes to show that they are diehard music fans, or at least Beethoven fans. It sort of feeds in, they stayed so we stayed, we stayed so they stayed. It's a very memorable expereince, and after this performance I can say 'Hey, I played with a flashlight!' Really, how many musicians can claim that? People can say that they broke a string, but this is for real. It was a lot of fun."

Related articles:
* Lighting up Beethoven, The Berkshire Eagle
* A Ghostly Concert at Tannery Pond, The Berkshire Review

Photo by Leslie Teicholz

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