Our guy is heading to the Big Time!
While we’re still riding the high of “our” artist bringing home a bronze medal from the Van Cliburn competition (Bill is suggesting we make him wear his medal on stage, so excited are we to show off his greatness!), we cannot help but share even more backstory about this talented young virtuoso who already caught our attention many moons ago. Back in 2019 BC (not referring to Bill Crane’s initials; meaning Before Covid), Evren was slated to come to PPI as a Rising Star. But, life got in the way (how do these kids balance all of life’s demands?) and, ultimately, he couldn’t come to Portland. Fast-forward to 2023, and it was Evren who reached out to us to ask to be included in our main series. Bill and Boris listened again, consulted and conspired to get this formerly-brilliant-kid, now totally-brilliant-grown-up-artist to come to open our 2025/2026 Timeless season on September 7. Then he went off and won bronze at The Cliburn!
Listening to Evren is, of course, the obvious way of perceiving and processing his talent. But goodness gracious, watching him! Do yourself a favor and look at him perform the glorious Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor with Marin Alsop and the Fort Worth Symphony at The Cliburn. Yes, his hands, like all pianists’, flutter like leaves in an autumn windstorm. But it’s his eyebrows, his mouth, his shoulders that move – subtly, gracefully – in complete embodiment of the sound. Here is a musician who visibly and viscerally becomes the music he plays. His utter sincerity, on stage and off, and his arresting pianistic sound (described by Van Cliburn commentators Elizabeth Roe and Buddy Bray as “incandescent” and “transcendent”) are what speaks directly to a listener’s heart and mind. And, with a program spanning Scarlatti to Bartók planned for his Portland performance, it is also abundantly clear that he possesses versatility and imagination, panache and bravery.
If you haven’t by now immersed yourself in the myriad videos available on the Van Cliburn YouTube channel, we urge you to stop doomscrolling and spend a few moments on something truly uplifting. This video, where Evren and two of his co-finalists, Vitaly Starikov and Angel Stanislav Wang, are interviewed by Vogue magazine’s Joe Sabia will, if not just make you smile, reinstill your belief in the goodness in the world. In classic “73 Questions” format, Sabia interviewed all the finalists’ parents and asked them a list of questions pertaining to their extraordinary children – some really open-ended (“Any piano advice for him?”), some really mundane and to the point (“What is his favorite food?”). Then he asked the kids the same questions – and made them watch their parents’ responses. The results are funny, tender, genial. To see the warmth, pride and support from the people who raised these young people, nurtured their talent and still anchors them to their core beings, to us, spoke volumes. Talent doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Our first listeners matter. Evren’s mom, Burcin, at one point, says: “He is joy personified on a stage. Who wouldn’t want that for their kid?” Evren has tears in his eyes hearing that. So did ours, on watching.
We learn that Evren loves his mom’s Turkish lamb stew with eggplant. That she adores hearing him play Schumann. That she shares his love for Beethoven. On being asked whether he has any superpowers, early in the interview, Evren smiles bashfully, shakes his head and says: “I don’t personally think I have any superpowers.”
Well, dear Evren. We all beg to differ.
Tickets to Evren’s performance on Sunday, 7 September are selling fast. Please go to www.portlandpiano.org to get yours!