Ran Dank returns to Keyboard Concerts — solo this time
By Donald Munro
We last saw the Israeli-American pianist Ran Dank perform at the Philip Lorenz International Keyboard Concerts series in 2021 when he performed with his wife, Soyeon Kate Lee, with whom he frequently collaborates. For his upcoming performance (7:30 p.m. Friday, Sept. 26, Fresno State Concert Hall), he’ll take the stage alone. I caught up with him via email to talk about his return visit.
(Ticket giveaway alert: You can win a pair of tickets to Friday’s concert by leaving a comment on this post. Deadline to enter is 8 a.m. Friday. Be sure to check your email on Friday afternoon if you enter.)
Q: How do your musical choices in terms of programming change when you perform alone?
A: Playing with Soyeon is as close as one can get to sharing music with someone who knows your every thought and impulse. Still, performing solo repertoire brings a kind of absolute freedom that is impossible to replicate—it’s just you and the music, with nothing mediating that relationship.
Q: For returning audience members, how would you describe the “greatest hits” of your career since you were last here?
A: That’s a tough question — so much has happened since then! One highlight has been the release of my album “Vers Le Silence,” which weaves together Chopin’s works with William Bolcom’s extraordinary “Twelve New Études.” Another memorable project was recording Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony for the Library of Congress. I’ve also been fortunate to travel widely for concerts in Hawaii, Spain, Korea, China, and Japan — each experience adding new perspective and inspiration.
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Q: What was it like to study with such an acclaimed pianist as Emanuel Ax? Were you intimidated the first time you met him?
A: Manny is an extraordinarily warm person. I was, of course, nervous before meeting him, but that disappeared almost instantly thanks to his graciousness and humility. He makes you feel completely at ease, which allows his generosity as a teacher and mentor to shine through.
Q: How often do you return to your native Israel to visit and/or perform?
A: Not as often as I would like, unfortunately. My visits have become more rare in recent years, and I miss it deeply.
Q: Tell us about “Music by the Glass.” It sounds like an intriguing way to bring new audiences to classical music. Can you give an example of a musical pairing with wine/food that is particularly appealing?
A: We founded “Music by the Glass” to engage young professionals — an audience that is often underrepresented in concert halls and in the leadership of classical institutions. Pairing wine and food with music was an idea we had long wanted to explore, and for that we rely on our collaborators. We create the program, and then wine experts listen to the music and propose their own pairings. Their creative interpretations of how a vintage or flavor resonates with a piece have led to some fascinating and unexpected combinations.
Q: You have an interesting structure for your Fresno program.
A: The idea is “musical pick-ups.” Each shorter, concentrated work sets the stage for a larger, more expansive one. Ravel’s miniature Menuet sur le nom d’Haydnnods to Classical elegance before yielding to Haydn’s own E minor Sonata, whose compressed drama blossoms into full sonata form. Liszt’s stark La lugubre Gondola foreshadows the swirling catastrophe of Ravel’s La Valse, where the waltz becomes both celebration and dissolution. After intermission, Chopin’s intimate Nocturne acts as a reflective lead-in to Schumann’s Carnaval, a full-length masquerade in which fragments, ciphers, and character sketches coalesce into a dazzling panorama. In each case, the shorter piece doesn’t merely precede the larger one—it anticipates it, ignites it, and infuses it with meaning.
Q: The Gubaidulina piece sounds intriguing.
A: The Piano Sonata is one of Gubaidulina’s first really major works, written back in 1965. What I love about it is that you can already hear so much of what would later define her voice as a composer. It’s a piece of extremes: it has these sudden, explosive rhythms and then passages that almost vanish into silence. The contrast is part of its drama.
The second movement is especially striking—it’s very sparse, almost like a meditation. Gubaidulina is one of those composers for whom silence is as meaningful as sound, and you really feel that here. Then the finale bursts out with this incredible energy—driving, percussive, very physical writing for the piano.
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What’s amazing is that even though she was still relatively young, you can already hear her uncompromising originality. This sonata feels like both a bold experiment and a personal statement, and it really foreshadows the depth and intensity of everything she went on to write later in her career.
Q: You have a son and a daughter. Have they expressed an interest in the piano?
A: Yes, I’m glad to say they both play the piano. My daughter Ella has also fallen in love with the cello, which has been wonderful to watch.
Q: In a world that seems to get crazier by the day, how do you think classical music can bring people together?
A: Classical music has a unique power to cut through the noise of the world. At its core, it speaks a language that transcends words, politics, and borders—it is emotion and humanity expressed in sound. In times that feel increasingly fragmented, music reminds us of what unites us rather than what divides us. Sitting in a hall, strangers from all walks of life can share the same melody, the same silence between notes, the same shiver of recognition. That collective experience—of beauty, reflection, and catharsis—is profoundly human. I think that is why classical music continues to bring people together: it reminds us of our shared humanity, even in fractured times.
Q: Anything else you’d like to add?
A: Only that I am truly excited to return to Fresno, and deeply grateful to Andreas Werz (the artistic director for Keyboard) for the opportunity to share this unique program with such a wonderful audience.
Alice J Pierson-Knapp
Thank you for your insightful interviews.
Would love to listen to this program.
Alice Pieson-Knapp
Amy
I attended a keyboard concert many years ago at FSU, afterwards feeling like I had a workout of sorts: it was hard to sit still and not multitask(!), the music was unknown to me and challengingly “non-classical”, and complicated emotions arose from me in the music’s presence. I’m flabby again, musically speaking, and need another “exercise session”. This one sounds rigorous!