Dana's Journey
Civic Voicings – The Boston Musical Intelligencer
by David Patterson
On the verge of its centennial, a full-size Boston Civic Symphony thundered through Carl Nielsen’s Inextinguishable, dreamed Claude Debussy’s Faune with professional, together with “exceptionally skilled student and amateur” instrumentalists, and introduced 16-year-old competition winner violinist Dana Chang in Henri Wieniawski’s second concerto. The Civic’s mission also places emphasis on developing a broad-based audience, whose presence at New England Conservatory’s revered Jordan Hall Sunday afternoon would make a difference as well.
With at least 15 classical music events around town, several of them symphonic and mostly occurring at the same time, it is a wonder as many chose to attend that did. And they came with more than enough spirit to go around. After what could be described as a silent prayer, Music Director Francisco Noya opened with Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune, Debussy’s solitary flute inviting a world of illusion, other BCS solo winds following each coaxingly voiced. Without baton, Noya elegantly induced the orchestra to dreaming with make-believe scenes becoming ever more real, ever more present, from a full-tone body of swelling strings, the whooshes of two harps, a forestry of wind-blown instrumental sonorities, the final delicate rings of a small antique cymbal closing our eyelids. An outbreak of audience appreciation awakened.
Featured soloist Dana Chang, winner of the Boston Civic Symphony 2023-24 Young Artist Concerto Competition, leaped apace into the third movement of the Wieniawski Violin Concerto No. 2 in D Minor with assistant conductor Fernando Gaggini. Possessing a fieriness for the Allegro con fuoco appassionato with manifest force and speed, Chang sang out the Tranquillo in broad strokes of the bow. The spiccato, a slightly bouncing bow, new to Chang despite violin studies since early childhood, further displayed exceptional control of technique. Allegro moderato à la Zingara arrived with her giving into a faint smile, the free-spirited folk dance full of youthful gusto. Even over the strength shown by a completely committed Civic, Chang’s single voice could be clearly heard answering with assurance and determination. And that performance had Civic’s players joining an unreservedly noisy show of well-deserved support from everyone at Jordan. And the future of the young prize winner? Dana Chang shares that while always having music by her side, she still wishes to pursue a good number of other studies as well.
A special moment was taken to honor Michele Mortensen, Civic’s Executive Director and “horn player at heart” who “took her final bow on the stage of life on October 7, 2023.” The mixed multitude of musicians chiming Elgar’s Nimrod variation engendered a deeply moving tribute.
Noya quoting Nielsen on his Symphony No. 4: “Music is life and, like it, is inextinguishable.” Again, with immediacy, becoming lifelike, a responsive Civic voice endured unflaggingly over the entire course of the Danish composer’s immense non-stop monument, surpassing a role of expressive proxy. A certain gaze from the orchestral corpus indicated an unmistakably real and spontaneous unfolding of the human condition. The Inextinguishable was alive: from the collective energy of the podium where a dressed-in-all-black conductor, the figure of a silhouette who silently signaled, to a mass of seated personages about the stage who alternately voiced and listened. Nielson’s orchestration allowed Civic’s members equal opportunity to participate in his music-is-life. And each and all did. It was written on faces. Wind trios and a solo cello spoke to each other, upper and lower strings exchanged volleys of temperaments, violas warned, brass announced tragedy and heroics, antiphonal timpani thundered Nielson’s message into the Hall. Civic got carried away and so did I.
At this meeting of sorts, humanity glowed in a dreamscape, a playground of violinistics, a funereal honoring, a musicscape of life in diminuendo, crescendo, accelerando, ritardando. Civic, Chang, Noya had much to voice.
David Patterson, Professor of Music and former Chair of the Performing Arts Department at UMass Boston, was recipient of a Fulbright Scholar Award and the Chancellor’s Distinction in Teaching Award. He studied with Nadia Boulanger and Olivier Messiaen in Paris and holds a PhD from Harvard University. He is the author of 20 Little Piano Pieces from Around the World (G. Schirmer). www.notescape.net
She was a track and cross-country runner and an aspiring marathoner. She was a competitive figure skater, a self-published author, and a fan of K-pop. She loved spending time with her family.
However, perhaps what Dana Chang will be remembered most widely for is her legacy as a violinist. Though accomplished in the competition scene, Chang, who died unexpectedly this spring, was most confident on stages where she could perform for the joy of it.
“She practiced very hard,” recalled her mother, Belmont resident June Song. “She really enjoyed it. We never pushed her … She loved school, and she loved the violin.”
At the age of 3, Dana began violin lessons. Within the year, her natural talent as a violinist was clear to all those around her. At 8, she entered her first competition. By 16, she had won first prize at the Boston Civic Concerto competition, earning the chance to perform as the solo violinist with the orchestra at the New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall— an achievement her parents point to as her proudest.
Song and Dana’s father, John Chang, who owns a dental practice on Concord Avenue, said their 17-year-old appeared perfectly healthy at the time she died—she was active and ate well. What they didn’t know, however, was that she was born with an undiagnosed heart anomaly. On April 11, she shared a meal with her family before going downstairs to the exercise room, where she fell asleep and never woke up.
“Nobody expected it,” Chang said.
A Rising Star
As a student at Walnut Hill School for the Arts in Natick, Dana planned to compete in the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition in May with the Highland Horn Trio. She studied with Isabelle Durrenberger and Soovin Kim at the New England Conservatory of Music Preparatory School. In the last several years, she participated in many seminars and workshops, music festivals, and orchestras.
“She never complained to me … she just wanted to do everything,” Song said. “Her academics were incredible. She was a perfectionist.”
As a rising senior at Walnut Hill, she had her sights set on applying to the Juilliard School in New York City or the New England Conservatory in Boston.
Beyond her contributions as a musician, Song emphasized her daughter’s ability to befriend others from all walks of life and her relationship with her older sister, Dayoon Chang, an accomplished figure skater whom she looked up to.
“Even though she had this heart condition … she had a normal life,” she said. “So many accomplishments. She never gave up.”
Continuing the Legacy
In recognition of Dana’s impact on others, the Walnut Hill School renamed one of its annual senior awards for this year and the years to come. The Dana Chang Friendship Award recognizes a student whose “interest and consideration of others is genuine and constant.”
Her family, too, hopes to honor Dana’s legacy through the creation of the Dana Chang Foundation, which will provide opportunities and resources to support young musicians. It also aims to raise awareness about the importance of the early diagnosis of heart anomalies. This year, in collaboration with the Walnut Hill School, two Walnut Hill students were awarded scholarships to cover the cost of New England Conservatory Prep fees this fall.
“They have been really supportive of us,” said Song, referring to the Walnut Hill School.
Though many events are expected in the future—including a 5K race next spring—the family first plans on a memorial concert at Jordan Hall on Oct. 21 at 7:30 p.m. Performers will include Dana’s friends and classmates at Walnut Hill and Dana’s aunt, Youngsook Song—a renowned Korean gayageum player— in addition to the school’s Grammy Award–winning musicians-in-residence, the Parker Quartet.
The family also plans to publish a new color edition of the book Dana wrote with the help of a tutor when she was 8.
Finally, the family plans to convert the space above Chang’s dental office in Cambridge into a recital space and classroom. Song said the classroom space would be a nod to Dana’s interest in reading and writing.
“This is a celebration of Dana’s life,” Song said. “We have to remember Dana. We have to do something.”
Tickets to the Dana Chang Foundation Inaugural Concert can be purchased online at: https://danachangfoundation.org/buy-ticket/.