🔊 TTS Settings
chapter 09
Three minutes remained until the deadline for applications to the Korea International Music Competition.
In a dark room, a young woman sat staring fixedly at her computer screen.
Her name was Choi Narae, looking perhaps a little younger than her early thirties.
Second place at the Chopin International Piano Competition, first place at the Ferruccio Busoni International Piano Competition, and second place at the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. With such achievements, she was now a professor at Chung-Ang University’s College of Music—and one among many students of the renowned Professor Lee Junghoon.
The reason she was reviewing a stack of applications this late at night was simple: she had been appointed as a judge for this year’s Korea International Music Competition.
“Haa… I really should’ve turned this down.”
Professor Choi blinked her dry eyes and sighed softly.
She had only agreed because her teacher, Professor Lee Junghoon, had asked her, but being on the judging panel was proving to be far more work than she had imagined.
There’s a student named Song Minwoo I’m looking forward to. You’ll like him too once you see him.
The message Professor Lee had sent her that morning flashed through her mind.
No matter how hard I search, I can’t find that name.
If Professor Lee went so far as to praise someone, it meant the student was truly talented.
But for some reason, no matter how many times she searched through the inbox, she couldn’t find an application under the name Song Minwoo.
Did he misremember the name?
Lately, with age, her teacher had been forgetting things now and then.
Choi Narae sighed and decided to refresh the inbox one last time.
[1 Unread Mail]
“An application submitted one minute before the deadline… Who is this?”
She had never seen a student cut it this close. Whoever it was, they must be quite something, she thought as she quietly opened the mail.
“Song Minwoo?”
It was the very name Professor Lee had mentioned.
“Age: 19. Competition history… none?”
No matter how many times she checked, there wasn’t a single competition prize listed.
Normally, anyone entering a competition of this scale had at least one or two records, no matter how small. But to have none at all was a first.
Could it be a different person with the same name? Doesn’t seem like someone Professor would single out.
Students without any experience entered major competitions for two possible reasons:
Either they underestimated music, or they were a late-blooming genius.
“Well, I’ll know once I hear the audition piece.”
She doubted it was the latter, but still, she downloaded the attached video without much expectation.
Then the gentle melody of E-flat minor began to flow.
Chopin’s Nocturne No. 2—the piece that came to most people’s minds when they thought of Chopin’s nocturnes.
It had been a long time since she’d seen a nocturne submitted as a competition piece.
Most participants chose technically demanding works, eager to show off their ability to handle difficult passages. Submitting a nocturne usually meant the performer was trying to mask limited skill with something that merely sounded pretty.
And she was certain this Song Minwoo was no different—
“!!”
A sudden, crystal-clear trill shattered her assumptions.
What is this? This impossibly pure trill…
For a moment, she thought she was listening live, not to a recording.
Chopin’s Nocturne Op. 9 No. 2 was one of the few works that avoided tricky ornamentation and dissonance. Instead, it carried a serene, gently blissful melody under a night sky.
Serenity and happiness.
On the surface, they might sound like they belong together, but every pianist knew how difficult it was to blend them.
Serenity was silence, silence was loneliness, and loneliness carried sadness. Happiness did not naturally fit with it.
But Chopin, the genius, had captured both in harmony within one piece.
Many, however, failed to understand this. Most amateurs played the nocturne as only serene or only happy.
Yet what was coming through the speakers now?
An almost flawless harmony of both.
Just listening was enough to make her feel as though the night sky of her faraway hometown was hanging before her eyes.
“A… a student played this?”
This was the kind of performance one would expect at a recital by a world-famous pianist. Not from a youth entering a competition.
Shivers coursed through her body as she stared at the attached photo of the applicant, Song Minwoo.
“…No wonder Professor was excited.”
In that moment, Choi Narae understood what kind of storm this student was about to unleash on the competition.
“Heheheh…”
A disturbing laugh echoed in the music room around lunchtime.
There was no piano sound—only laughter tinged with madness.
Just then, Lee Ji-hye, stepping inside, shivered at the sound and asked:
“You nearly gave me a heart attack. What are you laughing about?”
“Because of this.”
Song Minwoo, the source of the eerie laugh, held out his phone.
On the screen was a notice confirming his acceptance into the preliminary round.
“That’s it? You’re overreacting to something so obvious.”
“Obvious? I was half-worried I’d get rejected.”
“What nonsense. Of course you’d pass.”
Ji-hye flicked his forehead playfully.
Minwoo just chuckled and sat at the piano, starting a warm-up.
This time it was Czerny’s Op. 740, better known as Czerny 50. Standard etudes taught in piano academies.
Without a single mistake, he played exactly as written, with perfect timing and dynamics.
Since submitting his application, Minwoo had practiced nothing but Czerny for days.
With only two weeks until the preliminaries, one might think time was too short to waste on exercises. But his reason was simple:
You can’t build a house without a foundation.
If performance was the building, etudes were the foundation. A weak base would collapse easily.
So Minwoo had chosen Czerny to strengthen that base.
The 50 Studies were perfect for reacquainting himself with his current body.
Not bad… A week of practice paid off.
Compared to before, his fingers now moved with far greater ease.
No matter if the mind inside was Chopin, the body was still that of top-student Song Minwoo.
It carried bad habits born of self-teaching without a proper mentor:
Ignoring fingering, filling passages with improvised shortcuts, missing leaps and hitting wrong notes, pressing the sustain pedal too heavily so tones lingered too long.
Unique, perhaps, but really just bad habits.
He needed to fix them quickly.
Ji-hye tilted her head in admiration.
“You’re amazing. You mastered all 50 Czerny etudes in just a week. Never seen anyone like you.”
“If I stuck with it for a week straight, it’s only natural.”
In truth, he felt behind schedule—he had planned to finish in three days.
He flexed his hands lightly after the last note.
“But are you really going to practice only Czerny? Time’s short. Have you chosen your preliminary piece yet?”
“Of course.”
“What is it?”
“I’ll tell you later.”
A sly smile accompanied his evasive reply.
“And you, Ji-hye? What are you going to play?”
“…Wow, bold of you to ask when you won’t answer mine.”
She sighed but gave in.
“Chopin Etude, Op.10 No.3.”
“Chopin? Why?”
“Because everyone knows Chopin. That’s why.”
Minwoo reluctantly nodded.
Of all the brilliant pieces out there, why mine…
Liszt or Beethoven would’ve been safer choices, he thought.
But he overlooked one thing: the symbolic weight of Chopin’s name in the piano world.
He had been famous in life, but his music exploded in popularity after death. Combined with his own modesty, Minwoo—Chopin reborn—did not grasp how revered his works had become, both by the public and musicians.
“But honestly, I regret it a little.”
“Regret? Why?”
“Choosing Chopin. No matter how much I practice, I just can’t get what he must have intended when he composed it.”
“…Sorry.”
“Why are you apologizing? It’s Chopin himself who should be.”
Well, I am Chopin, that’s why.
Did she realize she was badmouthing Chopin right in front of Chopin himself? Of course not—it was unthinkable.
Smiling wryly, Minwoo rose from the piano.
“Huh? You’re done already? Lunch break isn’t over yet—”
“Sit. Let me hear your playing.”
“What, now?”
“Yes. Come to think of it, I’ve never once heard you play. I’ve been performing plenty in front of you, after all.”
He had always been the one receiving her help—now it was his turn to give some.
Well, partly an excuse. He couldn’t help without hearing her play first.
With that thought, Minwoo gently but firmly guided Ji-hye to sit at the piano.
And so, unexpectedly, Ji-hye found herself about to learn a Chopin piece directly from Chopin himself.
