This is the video of Etude Op.10 No.4 that I played for an encore in Liepaja, Latvia, after I played with Liepaja Symphony Orchestra! I had two concerts in Latvia; one in Riga, and the other one in Liepaja. This is one is from Liepaja conce...rt. :) The concert went really well. The concert was with pianists, Ms. Laura Fravre-Kahn from France, Mr. Anton Lyakhovsky from Russia, and me. Each of us played a different piano concerto with Liepaja Symphony. It was a great concert! Maestro Lakstigala is so amazing! I learned a lot from him and had a lot of fun working with him. The theater was so beautiful, too.
When I finished playing with the symphony, a boy came on the stage and gave me a cute teddy bear as a present! The bear is wearing a red T-shirt that says "I love Liepaja". It is SO CUTE! I placed the bear inside the piano where I can see him before I played an encore. :D I felt so good after the concert! It was such a fun concert!!

Liepaja is one of the three big cities in Latvia. From California where I live, it takes all day to get there. First I flew to Amsterdam, then flew to Riga. From Riga it was about three hours drive to city of Liepaja. Oh, by the way! I was in the airplane magazine!! It is Baltic Airline from Ameterdam to Riga. It was very surprising. :) You can see the magazine in my blog( http://www.umigarrett.com/umis-second-concert-with-liepaja-symphony-orchestra ) ! Just click. There are more pictures from this trip! Before and after the concert, I had a lot of time to tour the city. I went to the beach and found a lot of pretty shells. :) It was my first time to see a frozen beach! It was really cool! And cold. Haha. :) My friends, Kristians and Anete drove me to a fort and also showed me a Russian Church. It was a beautiful building as you can see also in my blog. I LOVE Europe because there are so many different cultures in very close distance. I'm part Lithuanian, Polish, German, Irish, so I feel a little bit like home whenever I'm close to those countries. :D Plus, the food is so yummy in Europe! ;) I think Latvia has the best chocolates! I kept finding good candies everywhere! :D And what I liked the most was after-the-concert-party at our hotel! All the performers, guests and Maestro Lakstigala came. I had a Latvian sour yogurt drink, and it was so good! :D It was so sad to say good bye to every one at the end. My flight to go home was at 5am, so I couldn't stay too long at the party, but when I came down stairs to ride in a taxi, everyone was still there. So I was able to say good bye to them again. I hope I will see everyone again soon! I miss everyone already so much!!

I hope you like this video. Please comment if you can. I really enjoy reading all your comments! Thank you, and see you soon!
Love,
Umi (=^x^=)See More

This is the video of Scherzo No.1 I played for an encore in Riga, Latvia, after I played with Liepaja Symphony Orchestra! I had two concerts in Latvia; one in Riga, and the other one in Liepaja. This is one is from Riga concert. :) It was a...t the beautiful Great Guild Hall, built between 1854 -- 57 in Riga. The original Hall was built in 14th century! :o It was a concert with pianists, Ms. Laura Fravre-Kahn from France, Mr. Anton Lyakhovsky from Russia, and me. Each of us played a different piano concerto. It was a great concert! Maestro Lakstigala is so amazing! I learned a lot from him and had a lot of fun working with him. The theater was so beautiful, too. After the concert, we had a chance to meet the former President of Latvia! I was so honored to meet him! I had some time to tour the city of Riga before the concert and after. Riga is so beautiful! The buildings look like a doll house and very colorful as you can see in the pictures in my blog (http://www.umigarrett.com/concert-in-riga-latvia). It was really really cold outside, but I still played with snow. ;)
I hope you enjoy this video. I would love your comments, too! Thank you very much! See you soon! Love, Umi (=^x^=)See More