“A masterclass more nerve-racking than a competition”···The maestro kept asking ‘why’ - 경향신문

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Violinist Leonidas Kavakos coaches at the ‘2026 Classic Revolution X Ewha-Kyunghyang Music Competition Laureates Masterclass’, co-hosted by the Kyunghyang Shinmun and the Lotte Foundation for Arts, in the rehearsal room of Lotte Concert Hall in Songpa-gu, Seoul, on the 5th. Kwon Do-hyeon, Staff Reporter

Violinist Leonidas Kavakos coaches at the ‘2026 Classic Revolution X Ewha-Kyunghyang Music Competition Laureates Masterclass’, co-hosted by the Kyunghyang Shinmun and the Lotte Foundation for Arts, in the rehearsal room of Lotte Concert Hall in Songpa-gu, Seoul, on the 5th. Kwon Do-hyeon, Staff Reporter

Greek-born world-renowned violinist Leonidas Kavakos pointed to the score. The piece being played by Kim Min-ha, a third-year student at Yewon School, was the first movement of Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto. It was the spot where the solo violin enters after the orchestra’s introduction and the music moves to the first theme. When the solo first appeared, Kim played a bit slowly, then slightly picked up the pace as the theme began. Kavakos did not miss that flow. The score reads ‘Moderato assai’, a marking that emphasizes a moderate tempo. Kavakos asked Kim: Why would the composer write this marking at precisely this point? How does that speed connect to the character of the music? He said, “You must not rush this section,” and then asked again, “If you had to describe this beginning in one word, what would it be? When we speak, we are conveying thoughts. It’s the same with performance. Music is communication.” After the class, Kim said, “It was a question that made me reconsider the ‘moderato’ I had taken for granted,” adding, “It was meaningful in that it made me think about why I play this way and what music I am trying to express.”

On the 5th, in the rehearsal room of Lotte Concert Hall in Seoul. It was the site of a masterclass (a public lesson in which a renowned performer teaches a small number of students) for this year’s Ewha-Kyunghyang Music Competition winners. On this day, four violin laureates stood before Kavakos in turn. Each lesson was officially scheduled for 45 minutes, but Kavakos’s sessions ran to nearly an hour per student. Students waiting for their turn said, “I’m far more nervous today than when I go out for a competition.”

Dressed in beige pants, a dark blue T-shirt, and sneakers, Kavakos turned the rehearsal room into a small stage. He hummed melodies, marked time by sweeping his arms as if conducting, and used his whole body like a dance to explain rhythm. He adjusted students’ bow hands and elbow positions himself, and let them compare by alternating their playing with his own. Throughout his explanations, his body kept moving with the music as he met the students’ eyes. Students who were stiff at first gradually relaxed their expressions as they played under his direction.

After sixth-grader Mok Jeong-woo performed Sarasate’s ‘Faust Fantasy’, Kavakos smiled and said, “This is music about dance, isn’t it?” To Mok, who had played with little bodily movement and a somewhat rigid posture, he began by loosening the bow hand with gentle wrist circles. “Now, hold the bow as if you’re cradling a small bird.” “Before you play, take your time and breathe first.” He also urged him to let the natural weight of the arm sink into the bow. The point was that the body needs to be free for the sound to move naturally. After the lesson, Mok said, “I had been worried about hitting wrong notes, which made me tense and stiff, and the teacher immediately pointed out exactly that.”

With Hwang Ah-young, who played Wieniawski’s ‘Variations on an Original Theme’, he had her listen for the multiple voices in the score. “What do you think is the most important note here?” “Which voice would be good to bring to the fore?” He explained that the highest pitch is not always the most important, and that one must decide which notes to bring out within the relationships of harmony and the various parts. In the section moving from A minor to C major, he likened keys to people: “C major has appeared wearing different clothes.” Even the same pitch takes on different roles and colors depending on the harmony and key it sits within.

For Kim Dong-hwi, a second-year student at Seoul Arts High School who performed Ysae’s Sonata No. 6, he asked for ‘freedom within the beat’. He emphasized, “You must not be dragged by the beat, but you must not lose it either.” He also described the relationship between the beat and the phrase (a musical sentence that continues in one breath) as a ‘time difference’. Just as the time shown by a clock and the time felt by the body differ, the beat may flow steadily while the phrase can slightly push ahead or pull back over it.

The questions he posed and the points he highlighted differed for each of the four students, but the class was guided by a similar direction. He asked why to emphasize this note, why to go at this tempo, and why to make this expression. It was not a time to receive correct answers, but a time to question and think about the music they had learned.

Professor Lee Sung-ju (Korea National University of Arts), a violinist who observed the class, said, “In regular lessons, when you first try to fix students’ technique, it’s easy to run short of time to talk about the music itself,” adding, “Kavakos kept asking how to understand the music and connect it to expression, while pinpointing the core for each student.” He added, “Even if it’s something they often hear, hearing it directly from a world-class artist becomes a different kind of stimulus for students.”

This masterclass was co-hosted by the Kyunghyang Shinmun and the Lotte Foundation for Arts. In addition to Kavakos, violist Antoine Tamestit, cellist Moon Woong-hwi, and pianist Jin Sang Lee offered one-on-one coaching to the winners in each category of the Ewha-Kyunghyang Music Competition.

Pianist Jin Sang Lee gives an individual lesson to an Ewha-Kyunghyang Competition laureate in the rehearsal room of Lotte Concert Hall in Seoul on the 1st.

On the 27th of last month, in the rehearsal room of Lotte Concert Hall in Seoul, violist Antoine Tamestit gives an individual lesson to a laureate.