iGnite Society’s first outdoor piano festival

By Staff Writers Rajorshi Chatterjee & Tushara Devapatla

On October 6 at 1-6 pm at Fremont Central Park, some of the Bay Area and the world’s finest pianists lined up outside for the third annual iGnite Festival. This festival, held completely outdoors, showcased a variety of pianists, dancers, and other artistic performances.

The festival was organized by nonprofit iGnite Music Society, that has sought to teach younger generations the importance of music by hosting events and festivals such as these, and by coordinating the North-Cal Youth Orchestra. The society organizes events such as this festival as a way to showcase the talent of their students to the public.

The first performances of the evening included a variety of cultural dances, singing, and a fashion show. These performances showcased many art forms aside from playing piano such as K-Pop dances, a rendition of “Never Enough” from The Greatest Showman, and many more. These performances helped to build anticipation for the piano performances to start later in the evening. While the hot temperatures were intense, the show went on with many booths around the area offering boba and other food for attendees to cool down. Other booths in the area also sold merch for the concert with profits going to charity.

A few hours into the festival, the main piano performances began bringing in many more viewers. The performances started off with Layla Guan playing “La Leggierezza,” a piece by Franz Liszt, followed by a complex set of concertos and symphonies from well-known composers such as Chopin, Mozart, Beethoven, and Rachmaninoff. As the night went on, the number of attendees continued to rise as the weather cooled. A total of 16 pianists performed, and the night ended with a performance by the young award-winning Russian pianist Elisey Mysin, who won the Cleveland International Piano Competition just last year, playing “Scherzo in E Major” composed by Chopin. 

The iGnite festival’s success was only possible with immense support, dedication, and energy from the organizers.  With iGnite’s last two festivals being inside events, this outdoor festival was able to garner much more attention with onlookers from the park joining in on the celebrations. However, because of it being outdoors, it also took a lot more organization to pull it off. The event as a whole needed coordination to get every performer there and ready to showcase their piece, the booths set up and ready, and the permits to play outdoors. “It’s been pretty challenging because of the outdoor circumstances … Finding correct materials, getting a permit, working out the performances, it was all really [time-consuming]. However, we are a community and we work together to make it happen,” event co-organizer Chloe Wang said. 

Despite the hurdles the organizers overcame to put on the event, it was a major success and showcased to the audience the amazing skills of the young pianists, just as iGnite had intended. In the end, the evening was filled with fun activities and wonderful music, providing the Fremont viewers an insight into the great musical talent of the younger generations.