- [Announcer] In partnership with the Curtis Institute of Music, WHYYY presents the following program.

- My name is Wei Luo and I'm a pianist and I come from Shenzhen, China.

I remembering the week before I left Philly.

The city was shut down around 6:00 PM.

I have never seen anything like that before and I was really worried because I feel like it's not the city I'm used to.

So I left Philly at like 5:00 AM to JFK, no people on the street.

JFK airport has much less people as I imagined.

I got back to Guangzhou which is a city close to Shenzhen with only like two hours drive.

And I was quarantined in a hotel in Shenzhen for 14 days alone.

That was a hard time, like, with all concerts and performing for like audience.

Especially during the 14 days of quarantine, I had no access to the piano.

(speaking in foreign language) How do I continue my study after Curtis is like closing?

So I was like so many questions were in my mind, so I remember it was a very like struggling time.

(lively piano music) So it's been a month I have been at home and have more time to practice, to study music, and to do more of things that I want to do.

But as a performer, I really missed the chance to share music with my audiences on stage and they really miss concert halls.

I first hear about the Curtis Institute of Music was from Gary Graffman, my teacher.

I have many of his recordings.

Shenzhen is a very famous piano city in China, like millions of children study piano here.

So Curtis is really famous in China and in Shenzhen.

And I remember one day in kindergarten and I heard a sound, a very magical sound from a black closet.

So I asked my mom, "Oh mom, what's that thing?

It's like a black closet that produces magical sound."

And my mom said, "Oh, that's a musical instrument called piano."

I asked her, "Can I study it?"

I remember my five-year old birthday gift was a upright piano from my parents.

(lively piano music) I was determined like around eight, believe it or not, that I want you to come to the US and to Philly to study piano at Curtis.

(lively piano music) (audience applauding) "Islamey: The Oriental Fantasy" by composer Balakirev and it's a very difficult and challenging piece to perform and to learn it, but it's very effective because it's a local Caucasian dance form from Russia.

("Islamey: The Oriental Fantasy Op.

18") (audience applauding) After I got back from the US, the first concert I did, that was a livestream concert with zero audience in the hall.

(speaking in foreign language) I was very worried as well, because it was my first time performing livestream concert.

But before I get on the stage, the stage director told me, "Oh, there are already I remember 7,000 people online waiting for you to perform."

(speaking in foreign language) Before I perform every piece, I gave a short talk in Chinese explaining why I love this piece and what's this piece about, what about the composer, and how he wrote it.

I was very excited about this new form of performing so that was a very unforgettable experience for me to perform for thousands of people online.

(speaking in foreign language) ("Piano Sonata No.

7 in B Flat Major, Op.

83") The second concert I did was in Guangzhou where I performed Rachmaninoff Second Piano Concerto with Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra.

So the audience was only 30% but I remembered the moment I stepped out from the stage, I almost cried because I heard the clapping and they were so enthusiastic.

I really miss that chemistry between the performer and audience.

This was a very major concert for my career in China because it was the closing season concert for Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra.

Performing a whole concert like solo concert or with orchestra concert, it needs a lot of energy like mentally and to do it physically, it takes a lot of energy and I want to be strong and fit.

That's also important to a healthy life.

I brought back my first album with Decca Gold Universal to China, and like many news reported and interviews asked me about how was my life in Curtis and in the US, and how did I make my first like major record with major recording label in your work?

So it also meant a lot to me to perform for Chinese people here and to share my music with them.

- Remember the first two takes you said were boring.

- Yeah.

- This last take was so, so good.

- This album is called Wei Luo.

We discussed that I want to use my favorite pieces to put on my first ever album.

My most recent Rachmaninoff Second Piano Concerto performance was with Shenzhen Symphony Orchestra in Shenzhen Concert Hall.

That was quite different because it has 75 percentage of audience.

So it was almost full from my perspective.

And since it's the third time I've been performing this piece in China after I got back, I was more brave and was more comfortable with this piece and I was more willing to take risks to perform it.

So I basically enjoyed that performance the most.

When I was younger, I was a very shy kid.

I was very introverted and I don't talk much to friends or to people, but whenever I sit on piano bench, I feel like, oh, that's me, and I have the opportunity to express who I am through music.

And I feel like it become one way of my communication.

That's why I love playing music and playing the piano.

Live concerts is so important because nothing can be like that because there's a chemistry between me and the audience only in the Concert Hall.

But since we cannot do it with sometimes with certain situation, so I tried to find other ways to share my music and stream my love for music with as many people possible.

("Piano Concerto No.

2 in C Minor, Op.

18")