Hello, and welcome to Night Of The Notables! My name is Yiruma, professional pianist, and composer. Although you may not know my name, you might have heard of a few of the pieces that I have written over the past couple of years. Songs like “River Flows in You” and “Kiss the Rain” have been the biggest hits in my career. In fact, my piece “River Flows in You” has become so widespread that many people have nicknamed it the modern “Fur Elise”. If you still don’t know who I am, maybe listening to my music may ring a bell.
Hit the link below to give my piece, “River Flows in You” a listen!
https://photos.app.goo.gl/znZPBTEEgbW7LnVZA
Perhaps you just have never heard of me. If that’s the case, it’s alright, I’ll introduce myself instead!
Ever since the age of five, music has been a huge part of my life. When I lived in Korea, I began to learn piano. I absolutely fell in love with the the instrument, and even began composing my own music when I was only in middle school.
At the age of ten, I moved to England, where I chose to study music. After graduating from the Purcell School of Music, I continued to pursue my dream of becoming a famous composer and studied music in the department of music at King’s College. However, my life took a turn when I released two albums in 2001. These albums ended up being huge hits, and a few select songs were recognized all around the music industry. Now, as the successful musician I am, I have released eight studio albums, composed lots of soundtracks for musicals, films, and plays, and have performed in tens and hundreds of concerts world-wide. To be completely honest, it isn’t easy being a musician, but in the end, I just want my music to be the energy that makes many people want to live a better life.
Please feel free to comment any questions you have below, and I will try my best to answer them! Thank you for visiting!
Thank you for sharing one of my favourite pieces of music with us. I listen to many of your songs online. Which is you favourite album and why? What inspirations do you draw from when composing your music?
Thank you! My favourite album would probably be “Best of Yiruma”, which is a compilation of all of my favourite pieces. But if we exclude that album (Since it’s the obvious choice), I would probably choose “First Love”. This was my second album, and the album that made my career what it is today. It includes all the most popular pieces like “May Be” and “River Flows in You”. In terms of my inspiration, it can range from past experiences, feelings, to sceneries. For example, one of my pieces, “Indigo”, was written based on the evening sky, while “When the Love Falls” was inspired from a past break up.
Hello there Yiruma, I found your song, “River Flows in You” oddly familiar; I’ve definitely heard it before. Maybe it was in a playlist on Spotify or something? I can’t quite place it. I do quite like the song, though. It’s very beautiful. I know you are a piano specialist but have you ever played other instruments before? Would you like to? Do let me know. 🙂
Thank you very much! To answer your question, I do play some other instruments like guitar. If you check out my piece “Indigo”, I’ve incorporated some guitar into it. However, I do mainly stick to piano, since that’s the instrument that I’m most comfortable with.
Beautiful piano playing! I first heard “River Flows in You” from the Twilight movie series. What did you think about having your work associated with vampires?
Thank you very much! To tell you the truth, the piece from the Twilight movie is not actually “River Flows in You”. It is a different song, but it does sound very similar. In fact, this movie actually accidentally promoted my piece due to the similarities between the two pieces. So, many people do end up associating “River Flows in You” with Twilight. However, when I first saw the similarities, I wasn’t actually upset as others may have been. In fact, I was quite happy that I basically got “free promotion”, since promoting music is quite hard. However, I also feel that my music is quite fitting with the theme of the movie.
Yiruma, I love and have always loved your music, and I wholeheartedly enjoyed to opportunity to listen to it again tonight! My question for you is this: if you could go back in time and give one piece of advice to your past self (before you released your first album), what would you say?
Thank you! To be completely honest, my advice to my past self would be to find a reason to pursue music before commiting your life to it. At the time, when I decided to pursue music in middle school, I simply chose that path because I had a talent for music. I did enjoy creating music, but if I had known the struggles that came with being a musician, I probably would have stayed away from this future. Due to my stage fright, I have a difficult time with concerts and performances, as it uses a lot of both physical and mental energy for me. So, if I had a reason to pursue music that outweighs the struggles of the music industry, I would enjoy performances and music a lot more.
Your playing is amazing. It is so deep and emotion-provoking…and so is your story. Thanks for sharing
Anita
I thoroughly enjoyed your playing. You have incredible talent! I didn’t know of this piece before now, but now that I’ve heard it, I will definitely listen to more of your work!
Yiruma, I have listened to some of your music already during my working hours that is relaxing and soothing. I will keep listening to your music. Just wonder which one you prefer, a player of your own music or a composer? How did you compose your music, and how long it took you to finish one?
Thank you! I hope you will continue to listen to my music in the future! To answer your question, I really enjoy seeing how different people interpret my music. Sometimes I like to release the sheet music before releasing the actual song so that I can see the unique ways that people play my music. I also really enjoy collaborating with other composers as they can bring so many different unique ideas to create music. So overall, I know I didn’t exactly pick one, but I think that both sides have their merits, and I enjoy working with them all. To be completely honest, most of my composition is done through improv based on how I’m feeling, or what I’m seeing at the moment. Since it’s mostly improv, it doesn’t take too long to come up with the piece once I have that inspiration, but finding that inspiration may take days or even weeks to find.
WOW! Your learning centre – and story- is so amazing! I loved listening to “River flows in you”! I learned so much! 🙂
Amazing performance Yiruma! I had a question: If you could be any kind of cereal, what would you be and why?
Thank you! This is quite an odd question, but I’ll try my best to answer it. If I were to be a cereal, I’d probably choose frosted flakes. Frosted flakes kind of reminds me of snowflakes, which I usually think of as gentle, yet charming. I wouldn’t necessarily say that it would describe me, but I think that it would perfectly describe my music style.
Yiruma, I know a young pianist who sometimes struggles with stage fright just like you. What piece of advice would you give him to help deal with this fear? How do you get through it?