Han-Na Chang (Korean: 장한나) (born December 23, 1982) is a South Korean cellist, conductor.
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She was born in Suwon, Gyeonggi-do, South Korea to Korean parents. Chang began studying piano at age 3, and began her study in cello three years later at age 6. In 1993, her family moved to United States, where she was enrolled in the pre-college division of the Juilliard School.[1] Also from 1993, she attended Mischa Maisky's masterclasses in Siena, Italy, and continued to study with him privately. In 1994, at only 11 years old she competed in the Fifth Rostropovich International Cello Competition, winning first against many musicians some being even double her age. At this competition she was awarded with both the First Prize as well as the Contemporary Music Prize.[2] In an interview Chang confessed that she had no expectation to win, but entered the competition for the chance to be able to play in front of the great cellist Mstislav Rostropovich. Another early mentor was Giuseppe Sinopoli, who is said to have influenced her decision to study philosophy at Harvard.
Winning the Rostropovich International Cello Competition opened the doors for Chang to study privately under Rostropovich himself. In 1995 she made her debut recording (Tchaikovsky's Variations on a Rococo Theme and Saint-Saëns' Cello Concerto No. 1) with Rostropovich himself conducting Chang and the London Symphony Orchestra.[3]
Chang has had the opportunity to appear in various televised concerts including the 1998 Easter Day concert from Munich with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Kennedy Center's anniversary gala. In 1997 she also appeared in the "Victoire de la Musique" awards, which were televised throughout places in Europe. She has been profiled by "CBS Sunday Morning" and CNN.
Chang has debuted all around the world in great orchestras including Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, Berliner Philharmoniker, the Boston Symphony, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Cincinnati Symphony, the Dresden Staatskapelle, the Israel Philharmonic, the London Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in Florence, the Minnesota Orchestra, the Montreal Symphony, the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, D.C., the New York Philharmonic, the NHK Symphony Orchestra in Tokyo, the Orchestre de Paris, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia of Rome, the La Scala Orchestra of Milan and the San Francisco Symphony.
Conductors with whom she has worked with all over the world include names such as Herbert Blomstedt, Myung-Whun Chung, James DePreist, Charles Dutoit, Mariss Jansons, Jesús López-Cobos, Zubin Mehta, Lorin Maazel, Riccardo Muti, Seiji Ozawa, Mstislav Rostropovich, Giuseppe Sinopoli, Leonard Slatkin, Gustavo Dudamel, Antonio Pappano, Yuri Temirkanov, Sir Colin Davis, Christoph Eschenbach, Krzysztof Penderecki, Gustavo Dudamel, and Yannick Nezet-Seguin.
She gave world premier of Krzysztof Penderecki's Concerto Grosso for 3 solo cellos and orchestra, in June 2001 in Tokyo with the NHK Symphony Orchestra, with Boris Pergamenchkov, Truls Mork and Charles Dutoit.
She also gave world premier of Lorin Maazel's "Giving Tree" for cello, narrator and orchestra in April 1998 in Munich with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Lorin Maazel.[4]
She gave the Asian premier of Isang Yun's Cello Concerto at ACM Festival in 3 May 2002 in Seoul with Korean Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sung Kwak.
Abiding in wisdom granted to her from her parents, her great mentors and her managers, Chang kept to a somewhat normal lifestyle during her schooling years. Instead of trying to take on too many performances, Chang spent time with friends participating in activities, such as watching movies and playing basketball. In an interview, she said that she loved playing basketball, but after hurting her finger a week before a concert she "sort of had to give up on ambitions to be a basketball player." Chang enrolled at Harvard University in 2001 to study philosophy. Even in interviews she gives nowadays, she says that she continues to keep the number of performances she gives per season under control, preferring to have time for further study, reflection, and musical growth.
Chang has been active in her native country South Korea in introducing classical music to children and adults alike. She has produced 10 short TV programs with MBC TV for children, each introducing such diverse music as the Swan, the Rococo Variations, and the Shostakovich, Prokofiev, and Chopin cello sonatas, as well as Rimsky-Korsakov's Flight of the Bumblebee, and the Ritual Fire Dance by Manuel de Falla.
Han-Na Chang received awards including:
In 2007, Chang made her conducting debut in Korea. In interviews, she said her wish to introduce the great classical masterpieces to a wider audience and especially to children and teens, encouraged her to take up conducting. This resulted in the "Beethoven Project" produced with the MBC TV, which introduced Beethoven Symphonies Nos 1, 3, 4, 5, and 7, each in one-hour long episodes covering the whole symphony with Chang's commentary and rehearsal footages.
Han-Na Chang conducted the Castleton Festival Orchestra in Benjamin Britten's Young Person's Guide to the Orchestrawhen she participated at Lorin Maazel's Conducting Masterclass along with other young conductors.
In July 2010, she conducted Manuel de Falla’s Master Pedro’s Puppet Show and Beethoven's Symphony No. 3, Eroica in Castleton Festival.
Chang has launched "Absolute Classic" at Sungnam Arts Center in Korea by conducting Tchaikovsky Symphonies in 2009. Chang had sessions of introducing Tchaikovsky's symphonies and of having conversation with audiences to let them be more familiar with the music.
The second Absolute Classic Festival was held in August 2010, with close to 200 applicants auditioning for the Festival Orchestra. 103 young musicians from Korea and other Asian countries were selected, and worked intensely for three weeks with Chang.
In December 2010 and January 2011, Han-Na Chang worked with the Bavarian State Youth Orchestra for two weeks and conducted them at five concerts in Germany, including concerts in Munich and Nuremberg and a recording of the Bayerischer Rundfunk. They performed Tchaikovsky's Francesca da Rimini and Shostakovich's Shostakovich Symphony No. 5. Following their successful tour together, she was appointed the Artistic Director of Das Bayerische Landesjugendorchester, the first in its 30-year history.
Chang has recorded Britten's The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra and Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 4 with the Bamberger Symphony in Bamberg, Germany in June 2011, which will be broadcasted through the Bavarian Radio Broadcasting network.