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For Jonathan Martin ‘25, it was the kind of opportunity music majors dream about–but few ever experience: performing and receiving feedback from Grammy winner Yuja Wang, one of the most admired pianists in the world. Wang was headlining a concert at the Ferguson Center for the Performing Arts later that night, and generously offered to conduct a masterclass with students of Dr. Benjamin Corbin.
Pressure? Oh–just a bit. But when Martin took his seat behind the grand piano on the big stage at the Diamonstein Concert Hall, he held on to the advice his professor had offered beforehand:
“He reminded me that regardless of how it went or what happened, it would be a valuable learning experience. I was a little nervous when I began to play, at least during the initial performance,” Martin said. “I chose to perform Scriabin because the piece is short, lyrical, beautiful, and offers musical challenges.”
After performing his first run through of the piece, Martin was able to shake off any lingering nerves, and the masterclass evolved into a collaborative working session. The atmosphere was constructive, Wang’s feedback was direct, and Martin said it made an immediate impact on his performance.
“She gave me an amazing example of how even very small differences in the way I physically press the keys down can create huge differences in the sound that comes out. There's a section of the prelude where a melody is presented, then echoed in a higher register. She showed me on the piano to approach the echo with a lighter, bouncier touch. It was genuinely eye-opening to me how much it helped make the echo have a distinctly different sound,” he said.
Martin plans to teach public school choir after graduation and will continue to perform and compose. He says the mentorship he’s received at CNU, along with the once-in-a-lifetime opportunities to learn from artists like Yuja Wang, have laid a solid foundation for everything that comes next.
“All of the opportunities here at Christopher Newport greatly contributed to my growth as a musician,” he said. “I don't know if I would have been able to receive the amount of high-quality artistic experiences anywhere else.”
Dr. Corbin, Associate Professor of Piano and Collaborative Arts and Director of Keyboard Studies, was thrilled his students could learn from such a respected artists as Wang, whose accolades include a 2024 Grammy Award for Best Classical Instrumental Solo for “The American Project,” multiple Grammy nominations, the Gramophone Award for Instrumental Album of the Year, and recognition as Musical America's Artist of the Year in 2017.
"It’s a rare privilege when one of today’s top pianists, Yuja Wang, shares her extraordinary talent at our University, and even rarer when she dedicates time from her demanding schedule to lead a masterclass for emerging pianists,” Corbin said. “Ms. Wang’s insightful feedback and awe-inspiring demonstrations were captivating, offering invaluable guidance to students she had only just met. In the spirit of Franz Liszt, the inventor of the piano masterclass, she generously shared an unforgettable hour of musical wisdom and thought-provoking artistic suggestions, leaving all of us, students and audience alike, with lasting enthusiasm and admiration."