Notes from a solitary pianist

Music and poetry

Born in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, in 2000, Ju began learning the piano at the age of 4. He graduated from the middle school affiliated with the Shanghai Conservatory of Music before earning both bachelor's and master's degrees from the Juilliard School in New York. He is now pursuing a diploma at the Hochschule fur Musik, Theater und Medien Hannover in Germany.

Ju began writing poetry in 2016, and over the years it has become inseparable from his musical thinking.

He believes the two arts share a fundamental language: interpretation.

"When I was younger, I read music literally," he says. "I saw notes and played notes. Later I realized that notes have life between them."

To him, a score, like language, is a system of symbols.

"Reading music is like reading a foreign language. You need experience, background and understanding of the creator's world."

As his poetry matured, it reshaped the way he approached music, just as music transformed the way he wrote.

"I no longer think poetry is only about writing words," he says.

The physical edition of Mist Without includes three new poems. They are neither explanations nor illustrations of the music. Instead, they exist beside the sounds — creating another layer of silence and meaning.

"Music and poetry should leave space for each other," he says.

DG China, the Chinese classical label launched by Universal Music Greater China in partnership with Deutsche Grammophon, announced the collaboration with Ju, describing the young pianist as "bringing to the label a distinctive artistic voice shaped by contemporary sensibility and poetic imagination".

"He is exactly the kind of young artist we hope to champion: deeply committed, highly individual, and capable of opening new conversations around classical music and artistic expression in China today," says Zhao Zheng, head of DG China.

With the support of the label and a growing international audience, Ju will embark on a concert tour of Chinese cities, including Beijing, Shenzhen, Guangdong province, and Wuhan, Hubei province, later this month.