Tracking Pianist Yuja Wang’s Heartbeats During Her Marathon Rachmaninoff Performance

The Carnegie Hall YouTube Chan­nel sets the scene:

On Jan­u­ary 28, 2023, pianist Yuja Wang joined The Philadel­phia Orches­tra and con­duc­tor Yan­nick Nézet-Séguin at Carnegie Hall for a once-in-a-life­time, all-Rach­mani­noff marathon that fea­tured the composer’s four piano con­cer­tos plus his “Rhap­sody on a Theme of Pagani­ni.” Through­out the per­for­mance, Wang—along with Nézet-Séguin, mem­bers of the orches­tra, and con­cert­go­ers in attendance—wore devices to track their heart­beats.

Unprece­dent­ed and insane­ly demand­ing, Wang made his­to­ry. These five pieces include two-and-a-half hours of music, 621 pages of score, and more than 97,000 piano notes.

How high did Wang’s heart rate go? We won’t pro­vide spoil­ers. It plays out above.

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