- Hi, my name is Yu-Heng Wang.

I go to the Shenendehowa High School and I play viola.

(viola and piano begin playing softly) You're currently hearing the Henry Vieuxtemps Viola Sonata in B flat, Opus 36.

It is a very treasured piece of the viola repertoire.

The piece has many emotional ups and downs.

It goes from extremely soft and quiet, to very loud fury and passionate, and especially like the sort of warlike state, sometimes, but it never ceases to have this sort of elegant quality throughout the whole piece.

(viola and piano continue playing) I actually first saw this piece in the NYSSMA manual, and I was like, "Okay, let me listen to it."

And it sounded great, so I started playing.

I started about two years ago, playing this piece.

And even though I've worked on it for so long, it's never ceased to be in very special place in my heart.

(viola sound lingering) The most challenging part about learning this piece might be actually not the fast sections that most of the piece takes up.

It's actually the slow section, the beginning, consisting of mostly whole notes.

It's very difficult because as string players, it's hard to maintain a clear and consistent sound with long held notes, and to deal with dynamic changes, as well as changes often in character is... makes it more of a challenge.

(piano and viola tempo and volume pick up) I didn't choose the viola for any very profound reasons.

I wanted to play the bass, but my parents actually thought it wasn't a good idea that I wanted to play the cello.

They didn't think it was a great idea either because it's very big and it's hard to carry, onto like a school bus and stuff.

So I picked the viola.

(piano and viola play sprightly tempo) Well, I will be pursuing hopefully a viola performance degree in college, and I hope to play in an orchestra someday and yeah, be a part of the music community with the instrument.

(viola and piano playing somber passage) I would like to thank Romeo Vashishth, a fellow violinist in the Empire State Youth Orchestra, for nominating me onto this program.

Thanks to him, I was able to have this incredible opportunity to come here and record.

So I would like to thank him for that.

I would like to thank my school orchestra teacher, Mr. Joseph Gumpper, for hearing me play this piece and giving me feedback on it.

I would also like to give great thanks to Sue Nazaro, my viola teacher, who has been with me for many many years, and has been a vital part of my musical journey through this piece.

I would also like to thank Michael Emory, my current teacher.

He helped prepare me on how to better play and better express the piece overall.

And I really enjoy it because of him.

(viola and piano music continue) I'd also really like to thank my parents, who are in this room right now, for supporting me in all my musical endeavors.

And they've always been really supportive of what I do all the time.

(viola and piano increase tempo) (viola and piano finish together)