Reviews
new yoRK TIMES
“…with great virtuosity and power, Miclen is a force to be reckoned with.”
Die Welt
“a musician of daring virtuosity with gripping access and noble elegance”
Grammophone (Andrew Farach-Colton)
“Miclen LaiPang walks Kreutzer’s perilous high-wire act with aplomb.”
SCHWÄBISCHE ZEITUNG
“Miclen LaiPang captured the hearts of the audience. The breakneck Solo Sonata No. 1 by Eugène Ysaÿe was presented by Miclen with a big chordal sound, squeaky clean double stops down to the greatest decimals, and with a touching cantabile.
In a duo with the pianist James Maddox, he electrified the audience with the breathtaking final movement of Saint-Saëns’ Violin Sonata op.75. Stormy applause and bravos, which swelled considerably after the encore “Hora staccato” by Grigoras Dinicu.”
Sud ouest
“The speed with which he was able to integrate, in just two days of rehearsals, in an ensemble with which he had collaborated only once last year, reports a very great artist.”
South Florida Classical review
“Sleeper captured the sardonic elements of the scherzo with the faux elegance of Miclen LaiPang’s violin solo having just the right sarcastic tone.”
South Florida Classical review
“Playing a second violin tuned a tone higher (per Mahler’s instructions), concertmaster Miclen LaiPang assayed Mahler’s cross between a country dance and macabre totentanz (dance of death) in the second movement with vigor.”
Kronen zeitung
“Miclen LaiPang on the 1st violin represented (pars pro toto) and embodied the intoxicating power and joy of the KUG orchestra.”
Weekend Special (ALBERT COMBRINK)
“An American wartime Violin Concerto, composed by the most lyrical of wartime composers, Barber’s work poses special challenges to any performer: balancing the nostalgic, romantic element, with a searing and burning emotional content, over two movements as elegiac as the third is maniacal. Miclen’s solution was the violin itself: every section focussed on the vocal qualities of the instrument, from the simple opening song in G Major to the deeply moving second movement. Miclen truly exploited the “crying” register” of the D String, and instinctively makes the vibrato tighter in that register, to give the notes an intensely human quality. When the slow movement builds to that enormous eruption, the effect was emotionally spot-on and you could feel the goosebumps as the orchestra responded in kind. He also brought something new to the “scotch-snap” material that the violin plays only once, right at the end of the first movement: there was a playfulness, a naughty glint in the eye, and a kick in the step, that I had never heard before and suspect I shall from now on always miss, when hearing others.
The frenetic last movement saw the violinist articulate with refinement throughout, never pushing to brashness or scratching – a real risk in this technical steeplechase of a work. Balance was, by all accounts, never an issue through-out the performance. Easy virtuosity and deeply felt musicianship was felt again in the encore, a version of Danny Boy that will forever be remembered by anyone who heard it. The perfect encore to an astonishingly moving Barber.”
Weekend Special (Deon irish)
“This was a wonderful account of a concerto which – being African – I rate as one of the Big Five. Laipang – playing a sweet-toned 1707 Stradivarius – is a compelling soloist both to hear and to watch. As frequent readers will know, I have a certain distaste for excessive display by instrumentalists; in general, I prefer the emotion to be found in the actual music recreated, rather than in excessive physical movements mimicking such.
Laipang is certainly not a restrained performer: and yet, in his case, the movements are so inherently organic to the actual process of creating the tone that they never assumes the status of the merely showy or affected. Indeed, the very sound that emanates from each bowed string appears to have its source in the sole of a foot: his entire body seemingly coiling energy into a bowing arm of infinitely precise dynamic gradation.
The left hand, in contrast, floats with an apparent weightlessness over the strings and conjures intervals and chords of intonational fidelity. One has the idea that Laipang relishes performing this work: certainly, he approached it with an assurance that spoke of a respectful familiarity and his employment of tempi alterations and rubato further testified to a experiential personalization.
This did not make Gueller’s task in accompaniment any easier; but – unlike with the previous the week’s Beethoven 4th, in which the pianistic vagaries did occasion some breakdown in taut ensemble – Laipang’s musical solutions were sufficiently organic for Gueller to become attuned to them and the orchestral accompaniment was pleasingly with the soloist in consequence.
This was a deal easier, of course, in the quite glorious account of the central Canzonetta, an idyll of unrestrained beauty. But the outer movements were equally taut: an opening allegro which, without careful handling, can sound somewhat episodic; and the exhilarating finale, taken at an almost reckless tempo by the mercurial soloist and plunged into by an orchestra in joyous pursuit. A wonderful performance.”