Amy Sze isn’t old enough to vote in the midterms, but this kid already has one impressive resume.
A 17-year-old violinist who grew up in Pismo Beach, Sze now studies at the Crossroads School of Arts & Sciences in Santa Monica and violin at the Colburn School. Her list of awards, recognitions, concert credits, and scholarships is astounding for any studying classical musician, especially one who has yet to graduate high school.
The Santa Maria Philharmonic Society has called on Sze to be the featured soloist in the opening concert of this season, tackling one of the greatest known works of violin literature: Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s “Violin Concerto in D Major” on Sept. 29. Sze has performed with the orchestra before for its youth Concerto Competition, but she’s back as a paid soloist, a noteworthy milestone for any classical musician.
And the importance of that milestone isn’t lost on Sze.
“I never imagine that this would ever happen, especially when I was a lot younger,” she said. “I always wanted to be a musician, but everyone told me, for my own good, that if you were to be a musician you would be poor. So, I kind of put that aside, but that was the thing that I love the most.”
Performing with the Santa Maria Philharmonic comes with an added meaning for Sze, as her first violin teacher is among the orchestra’s ranks. She studied with Grace Seng beginning at the age of 3, moving on to an increasingly difficult repertoire over the years.
And other members of the orchestra have helped guide Sze musically over the years as well, she explained. She even performed at the Philharmonic’s first Youth Showcase event and several since, so the organization and its orchestra are like a musical home for her.
“I feel really thankful for all of those people who are mentoring me that now they are playing with me,” she said. “It’s kind of weird, but it’s amazing to think of this happening.”
It feels more like a homecoming because Sze also lives most of the school year in Los Angeles while she studies at her schools. She started there in 2015, taking lessons with Aimée Kreston at the Colburn School through the Richard Colburn Scholarship. She studies some of the most impressive pieces by late-romantic composers like Prokofiev, Rachmaninoff, Grieg, and many others.
The Crossroads School is also a hub of creativity with students of all the arts, from design to painting to stage and music, she said. Many of her peers there are high performance musicians like her.
“It’s nice being around people who can relate to everything,” she said. “Just the passion and everything you have to put into it.”
Sze practices several hours a day, every day. Most often it’s at least four hours, she said, but she can easily spend six if she’s engrossed with a piece.
That’s why she doesn’t care for the term “prodigy,” which gets lobbed so often at talented young performers. She puts in a lot of work, Sze explained, to play at the level she does.
“I would feel conceited if I would call myself that,” she said. “I would like to say that I work hard.”
And you have to work hard to be able to play the Tchaikovsky concerto, which goes on for nearly 40 minutes. It’s one of the best known pieces in violin repertoire for its virtuosity and beauty.
The work had an immediate effect on Sze, she explained.
“When I first heard this piece I think was crying or almost crying, and I was 6 or 7,” she said. “So I’ve always wanted to play that piece.”
Tchaikovsky was a composer famous for wearing his heart on his sleeve, and his “Violin Concerto” is a deep dive into his emotional world, she explained.
“You can feel that he was in a lot of pain,” she said. “Because he was gay, he had to hide that for so long. He couldn’t even dedicate this concerto to the person he loved.”
The piece pulls on every technique in the violinist’s skill set–speedy double stops, vaulting arpeggios, and trills galore. Sze has performed it a few times already with other orchestras, so her collaboration with the Santa Maria Philharmonic will be an informed performance.
Sze’s style, like the piece by Tchaikovsky, is a perfect balance of technical brilliance and emotional expression. He is one of her favorite composers because of his virtuosic yet heartfelt style, she explained.
“Sometimes I get carried away when I’m playing one of his pieces or something similar; 40 minutes is a long time to stay calm,” she said. “There are certain parts that I replay because it makes me feel happy to be alive, just listening to it.”
That sounds exactly like the kind of artists the Santa Maria Philharmonic always tries to attract from areas like LA or New York City. While she is technically coming from LA, it’s great to see a young local talent that the Philharmonic helped cultivate welcomed to the stage as an equal.
Sze said she is hopeful to get into a few different music schools at the collegiate level, but she doesn’t have a dream school picked out just yet. Already at the professional concert level as a high schooler, I think the chance to see Sze perform with the Philharmonic is an opportunity to hear a rising star at the beginning of a long, celebrated career.
“I just hope to continue playing the violin and sharing music with people because I think it connects people in good ways,” Sze said at the end of our interview, only adding, “I really love my parents and my teacher because they sacrificed so much, and I’m super thankful for them right now.”
Managing Editor Joe Payne is thankful for all musicians of greatness. Contact him at jpayne@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Sep 27 – Oct 4, 2018.