By Amelia Parry
Meet Angela Zhu, this year’s summer season artist known for her talents and geniality in piano. You may have seen her in multiple choir performances, accompanying the singers with her piano skills. Angela has played with Mr. Buchan’s Senior and Junior choirs since she was in the eighth grade. Now a Grade 11 student, Angela has travelled to multiple places to compete representing Collingwood, winning multiple awards in the process!
First, some background information about this musical star. Angela has many hobbies other than piano. She enjoys reading, listening to music and playing soccer. Angela claims that she loves reading and listening to music because it takes her mind away from stress. She states that when she is reading, she is “able to enter a whole new world.” Her favourite books are: All The Bright Places, Girl In Pieces and We Were Liars. Regarding sports, she loves to play soccer, scrimmaging with her soccer teammates and practising her foot skills. Angela also assistant coaches a soccer team of young girls, where she has learnt the qualities of leadership and organization.
Concerning Angela’s in-school passions, she loves psychology, participating in the AP Psychology class this past year. Angela has invariably been extremely interested in exploring mental processes and why humans act the way they do. She explained that there have been several experiences that have prompted her curiosity towards the field of psychology. For one, Angela plays piano weekly for the Inglewood Care Centre. During normal day-to-day activities, the residents who deal with Alzheimer’s seem very stressed and agitated, but they seem to calm down right away once she starts playing the piano for them. This experience caused Angela to wonder why memory regresses, and mental capabilities decline as people age. Angela’s older sister has also dealt with an eating disorder when she was young. At the time, Angela claims she felt very helpless and scared. She wanted to learn more about the psychological field so that she could understand her sister’s compulsive behaviours and support her.
Angela is a fantastic pianist. She started at the young age of 7 because she wanted to follow the lead of her sister. Angela explained that “[her sister] had started piano lessons that year, and [she] wanted to be just like her.” Angela is truthful with her relationship with the piano. She claims that it used to stress her out, as she felt she was never good enough; thus, Angela was never able to enjoy the experience of playing the piano. Thankfully, after years and years of honing her piano skills, she can now play any piano piece without any difficulty. Angela states that playing the piano is now a blissful and liberating experience. She can genuinely embody the music, letting all her emotions run through it.
Because Angela walks in the footsteps of her sister’s piano shoes, she is her biggest inspiration. Angela says that her sister pushed her to get better and better at the piano. Since Angela started playing later than her sister, she fell a few levels behind and would push herself to practice to catch up to her skill level. Angela said: “I worked hard so that one day I could say, ‘now I’m the better pianist in the family!’”
Since starting piano from a very young age, she has grown up with it. Practising piano was always very vigorous; for those who have tried to play the piano, it is much more complicated than it may seem. Some days, in preparations for concerts, exams or competitions, Angela practised for up to 6 hours playing the same song repeatedly. This requires a lot of energy, focus and perseverance. Angela believes that her experiences playing the piano have helped her develop endurance. This has helped her a great deal in school. Thanks to the piano, she was able to persevere through challenging courses, pushing herself to be the best student possible.
Angela is not thinking of pursuing a career in piano, although she could become a professional performer. Despite the options for a job, Angela had always enjoyed piano more when there wasn’t any pressure. She claims, “I would love to continue playing piano in the future, but more so as a side hobby than an actual job. That way, I won’t be in danger of losing my passion for it.”
Meet Angela Zhu, this year’s summer season artist known for her talents and geniality in piano. You may have seen her in multiple choir performances, accompanying the singers with her piano skills. Angela has played with Mr. Buchan’s Senior and Junior choirs since she was in the eighth grade. Now a Grade 11 student, Angela has travelled to multiple places to compete representing Collingwood, winning multiple awards in the process!
First, some background information about this musical star. Angela has many hobbies other than piano. She enjoys reading, listening to music and playing soccer. Angela claims that she loves reading and listening to music because it takes her mind away from stress. She states that when she is reading, she is “able to enter a whole new world.” Her favourite books are: All The Bright Places, Girl In Pieces and We Were Liars. Regarding sports, she loves to play soccer, scrimmaging with her soccer teammates and practising her foot skills. Angela also assistant coaches a soccer team of young girls, where she has learnt the qualities of leadership and organization.
Concerning Angela’s in-school passions, she loves psychology, participating in the AP Psychology class this past year. Angela has invariably been extremely interested in exploring mental processes and why humans act the way they do. She explained that there have been several experiences that have prompted her curiosity towards the field of psychology. For one, Angela plays piano weekly for the Inglewood Care Centre. During normal day-to-day activities, the residents who deal with Alzheimer’s seem very stressed and agitated, but they seem to calm down right away once she starts playing the piano for them. This experience caused Angela to wonder why memory regresses, and mental capabilities decline as people age. Angela’s older sister has also dealt with an eating disorder when she was young. At the time, Angela claims she felt very helpless and scared. She wanted to learn more about the psychological field so that she could understand her sister’s compulsive behaviours and support her.
Angela is a fantastic pianist. She started at the young age of 7 because she wanted to follow the lead of her sister. Angela explained that “[her sister] had started piano lessons that year, and [she] wanted to be just like her.” Angela is truthful with her relationship with the piano. She claims that it used to stress her out, as she felt she was never good enough; thus, Angela was never able to enjoy the experience of playing the piano. Thankfully, after years and years of honing her piano skills, she can now play any piano piece without any difficulty. Angela states that playing the piano is now a blissful and liberating experience. She can genuinely embody the music, letting all her emotions run through it.
Because Angela walks in the footsteps of her sister’s piano shoes, she is her biggest inspiration. Angela says that her sister pushed her to get better and better at the piano. Since Angela started playing later than her sister, she fell a few levels behind and would push herself to practice to catch up to her skill level. Angela said: “I worked hard so that one day I could say, ‘now I’m the better pianist in the family!’”
Since starting piano from a very young age, she has grown up with it. Practising piano was always very vigorous; for those who have tried to play the piano, it is much more complicated than it may seem. Some days, in preparations for concerts, exams or competitions, Angela practised for up to 6 hours playing the same song repeatedly. This requires a lot of energy, focus and perseverance. Angela believes that her experiences playing the piano have helped her develop endurance. This has helped her a great deal in school. Thanks to the piano, she was able to persevere through challenging courses, pushing herself to be the best student possible.
Angela is not thinking of pursuing a career in piano, although she could become a professional performer. Despite the options for a job, Angela had always enjoyed piano more when there wasn’t any pressure. She claims, “I would love to continue playing piano in the future, but more so as a side hobby than an actual job. That way, I won’t be in danger of losing my passion for it.”
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