Jocelyn Ho

‘Cherish your visions; cherish your ideals; cherish the music that stirs in your heart, the beauty that forms in your mind, the loveliness that drapes your purest thoughts, for out of them will grow delightful conditions, all heavenly environment; of these if you but remain true to them, your world will at last be built.’ I believe this quote by James Allen captures the very essence of life and music-making.

Hailed as an artist possessing ‘a surprisingly unrelenting physical technique’ (The Australian) and ‘drawing unbelievably beautiful sonorities from the piano’ (2MBS Magazine), Jocelyn Ho has distinguished herself as one of the leading young pianists in Australia. She has won major piano competitions in Australia and overseas, including the first prize and the special prize for music by Haydn, Mozart or Beethoven in the 2010 Australian National Piano Award. She has also won the Sydney Conservatorium Concerto Competition, the Kawai Award, and has performed at the Sydney Opera House, the Dame Elizabeth Murdoch Hall at the Melbourne Recital Centre, Parliament House, the Isabella Gardner Museum in Boston, and extensively in the United States of America and Europe. A recipient of the 2007 Australia Day Award by the National Council of Women New South Wales, Jocelyn Ho has been broadcasted worldwide, including frequently on ABC Classic FM on which her recital was featured live, 2MBS FM and Radio Television Hong Kong Radio 4. Her album, Luminous Sounds, was released by Master Performers in January of this year and was featured with her interview in ABC’s Limelight magazine. Also a composer, Jocelyn Ho has had her works performed worldwide, from the Sydney Opera House to the Kansas City Fringe Festival and Tutti New Music Festival in the USA. Influenced by her background in pure mathematics, her compositions have garnered her invitations to give talks and lecture-performances internationally, including at the 2011 Third International Conference of Mathematics and Computation in Music held at IRCAM, Paris; the Music, Pattern and Mathematics Workshop held jointly by the University of Edinburgh and Queen’s University in the United Kingdom; the International Image Conference in UCLA and the colloquium series at the University of Minnesota–Twin Cities in the USA. Her composition teachers include Chen Yi and Anne Boyd. Jocelyn Ho holds a Master of Music at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, a Bachelor of Science in mathematics and computer science at University of New South Wales and a Diploma of Arts at the University of Sydney. As a theorist, she has published papers in the American Mathematical Monthly and the Springer LNAI series. Currently, she is completing a Doctorate of Musical Arts with Gilbert Kalish at Stony Brook University. Her past teachers include Gerard Willems and Ian Hobson. Jocelyn is a Young Steinway Artist.

I think my greatest personal achievement to date would be making myself known as a pianist first and foremost, and also a composer and a theorist. I take great pride in succeeding in balancing and integrating these different facets of music. Winning the 2010 Australian National Piano Award and the release of my CD Luminous Sounds have been a highlight of my piano career. Presenting at the Third International Conference on Mathematics and Computation in Music at IRCAM, Paris has been eye-opening. I have always had an interest in combining mathematics and music and being able to be a presenter at such a historical place for contemporary music has been truly exciting.Education and training are extremely important. I believe particularly in education and training that allows a person to continue learning and exploring creatively and independently. I think being successful is all in the attitude - I am stubbornly persistent and thick-skinned! I think that determination, a clear vision and a strong belief in myself were major keys to getting to where I am now. Being open and willing to accept failure are also extremely important for growth. I have a wonderfully supportive family, and I could not have done anything without them. There were people along the way too: my late piano teacher in high school who really nurtured my self-confidence in those crucial years of youth. I also had a very good friend in high school who told me in all seriousness and sincerity that I could achieve anything that I wanted to. That sense of having the ability and the resources to do absolutely anything really stuck with me. Every human being has infinite potential and it is up to us to realise it and help each other realise it. It is amazing how much we can permanently influence people that are close to us by expressing something genuine and loving, no matter how small or big.I love music, it has been my passion for as long as I remember being passionate about anything! When I was five, a family friend gave us a really old and beaten-up upright piano (I still remember the thousands of scratch marks on the cabinet, the polish was all gone and it was brown and tattered). I asked my mother to have piano lessons, and that was how it started. There were many people along the way who supported me to be a professional musician. One of them was my high school music teacher Miss Casey, who gave me the opporunity to join six or seven different groups that mostly happened at lunchtime (that is why I eat so fast nowadays) and gave me freedom to pursue what I wanted. Some of them were pretty eccentric, looking back, there were a flute ensemble with eight or nine flutists (god knows how we sounded!) and a madrigal group. I have many, many fond memories of music in high school. I did struggle with the decision to pursue it professionally though. During my time as an undergraduate, I explored several other career avenues: I did a year of medicine at UNSW when I was 18 but ended up taking computing 1A as a fun subject (a bit of fresh air in between the anatomy and biochemistry classes) and liked it so much more! So I majored in pure mathematics, computer science and music and very much enjoyed the combination. I did seriously think about being a mathematician, but I was never truly happy within myself not being able to spend enough time at the piano and knowing that it would only ever be a `side thing.’ For me, being able to share music with others on the stage is an irreplaceable joy. I feel very fortunate to be a musician; as I grow older, I find music and the process of music making to be intertwined with life and living. On one level, musical compositions can capture so intensely the different facets of life - profound and unspeakable emotions and passions can be so well-conveyed in the musical language. On a deeper level, the process of learning a piece of music is like getting to know someone. Philosopher Theodor Adorno, in discussing musical analysis, speaks of getting to know a piece on its own terms. This resonates with me very much in dealing with and being accepting of people. When learning a piece, I spend a lot of time with it at the piano, but also away - when I am just thinking about it, and imagining its possibilities. Similarly with people I am close to, spending time with them is as important as spending time away from them in order to reflect, remember, assess and dream. This coming together and going away makes my relationship with the music grow, as my understanding deepens. I find it richly rewarding, like forming a strong bond with a life-long friend. Making great music is a process of unifying the composer’s vision and my musical mind and body. Every musical idea has a physical expression, in specific movements of the hands, the arms, the whole body. The better the connection between the physical expression and the musical idea, the more fully realised the music is. Playing music makes me aware of the self in its fully organic form with the total unification of mind and body; this resonates very much with my spirituality. Thus, music is experiencing life, living with other people and living with the self in a microcosm. In this way, my work ethic and life ethic are in constant exchange. As I live, I play music, and as I play music, it informs me of my life.I have had a few mentors in the past, one of whom is Australian pianist Gerard Willems. He has taught me so many things about music and about a positive and open attitude to life. Another is Australian composer Anne Boyd. I very much look up to her as a female Australian composer and a great educator. In using Asian music in her compositions and embracing Australia as part of the Australasia region in the cultural sense of the term, she opened my eyes in seeing the political power of music and made me think very hard about my contribution to society as a musician.I think the psychological aspect of a performing career is extremely challenging. I lock myself up in a room with a piano for a great part of the day, and sometimes it really is mentally very draining. In everything I do, I try to master it to the level of excellence, constantly and daily - alone. It can really get to me sometimes! The process is really between oneself and the music. I think keeping perspective and a balanced lifestyle is so important to maintain a healthy mindset.I think my passion and interest in what I do alone motivates me. As a pianist, I think about my music constantly. A great piece of music is like a really fantastic and fascinating person, and learning it is like uncovering his or her mystery. It is constantly exciting! For instance, I fly very frequently, and during my trips I find myself playing over and over in my mind ways of how a phrase could be conceived. By the end of my trip, I can’t wait to get to my piano to try it out, work with it, mould it. Maybe it is a little obsessive, who knows!As a musician, I am very fortunate that work and life have a constant interchange. For me, I have to have a life to make my music meaningful! That is what I love about music, there is not really a conceptual split. Time-wise, I place a lot of importance on family. The highlight of my week is Saturday evening, when my little cousins, my aunt’s family, my family and my grandmother all go to church together and have our family dinner at home, being noisy and silly together and having a great time. I think achievements and career success would be empty if I couldn’t share it with my loved ones.In this day and age everything seems easier for women to reach their career goals, but outmoded expectations and thinking are still very prevalent. I am waiting to see the day when both fatherhood and motherhood are celebrated equally and perceived with the same importance, and have this mindset implemented everywhere in the workplace of Australia.IWD means being thankful to all the women in the past who have worked for the freedom and choices that I have today. It is a celebration of the indispensable roles, achievements and qualities of women around the world and in our families. It is a sobering reminder that there still exist many gender inequalities that we need to overcome.Given another 100 years, I would like to see respect and equality for women in every aspect of society. One in four women today still suffer some kind of sexual violence. This is gender inequality on the most basic level that needs to be addressed. I believe equality has to be achieved from the bottom up; in everyday life, there are still a lot of attitudes towards women that hinder this. For instance, in the media, there is starkly-biased objectification and over-sexualisation of women that can readily be witnessed in, say, the pop music industry (just switch to the music video channel and the situation of scantily-clad women dancing around a full-clothed man is sure to pop up). This projection of women as sex objects is far from sexually liberating but is detrimental to the respect of women, ubiquitously so because of how mainstream pop music is. I would like to see a real respect for women everywhere achieved before the next IWD centenary. I also have a desire to see music in the concert hall more representative of women. I think times are already changing with the prominence of living female composers. Practically speaking, the make-up of works by female composers that we hear in the concert hall is still far from being representative. I would really like to see this being changed over the next 100 years.As a woman in 2011, I feel proud of my independence and the freedom and resources available to pursue my dreams and beliefs.Nature is an infinite source of inspiration - I used to do a lot of my studies and research out in the backyard porch overlooking our big eucalyptus tree and hearing the birds come and go. I think it is so inspiring because you know it is always there, and it can never run out as a spiritual resource. Also, I think intelligence and compassion go hand-in-hand. Together, they can bring about significant, positive change in the world.

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