Acclaim

“The exuberant Saeka Matsuyama epitomized the best in modern Juilliard School playing: open-hearted and healthy. A performer of palpable individuality in demeanor as well as musical presentation…Her Beethoven Sonata was blessed by an incandescent sense for musical line, and the Adagio of Brahms’ Concerto reached out with a soulful intensity.” – The Strad

“…you had to marvel at [Saeka Matsuyama’s] interpretive sophistication and drive” – The Philadelphia Inquirer

“…Matsuyama’s luminous tone and wonderfully concentrated lyricism…” – The Philadelphia Inquirer

“The musician who made the biggest impression on me recently is Saeka Matsuyama…Matsuyama displays an impressive ability to move between widely varied composers and periods and capture the special nature of each one…She slipped into the world of each one with the flair of a skilled actor who can immerse himself in half a dozen personalities in the course of a single one-actor play…Matsuyama handled [Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy] as if she thoroughly understood the appeal of every section. The Scottish Fantasy possesses a built-in ability to enchant audiences, but Matsuyama’s extra insight turned a likeable piece into a spellbinder.” – Tom Purdom, Broad Street Review (Philadelphia)

“…the enormously talented and musically compelling Japanese violinist Saeka Matsuyama…[she] showed her mastery, rich in tone and confident in expressivity, [in] Sibelius’ Violin Concerto, Opus 47 in D Minor. We could sense that this young violinist was the truest sort of dynamo. She was in command, of her instrument and this score…” – Santa Barbara News Press

“Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto is often played, but not always with the dark passion of Saeka Matsuyama…Certainly, there was a certain sweetness to her tone — a sweetness that added a shade of plaintiveness to the sad opening theme in the first movement. But there was an intensity as well…much of this intensity radiated from Matsuyama herself. A deep connection with the music was married to crisp precision. There are many moments when the music seemingly turns somersaults — where the violin’s gracefully rising and falling line begins tracing dazzling curlicues. At such times, Matsuyama’s rapid, clean playing was breathtaking.” – Peoria Journal Star

“Violinist Saeka Matsuyama offered…great passion in a big-hearted take on Bruch’s ‘Scottish Fantasy’…Matsuyama didn’t give in to nostalgia, though, and gave the melodies their rustic due, especially in double-stopped passages that required a folk fiddler’s grit and determination…both she and the orchestra played solidly to the close.” – Haddonfield Courier-Post

“The program succeeded in highlighting new talent, presenting a Juilliard student named Saeka Matsuyama as a lyrical soloist in the last movement of Mozart’s Fifth Violin Concerto.” – The New York Times

“…[a] violinist whose stylish work made an impression was Saeka Matsuyama…with cellist Clancy Newman, [she] gave the Brahms Double a bracing interpretation free of cliches.” – Lesley Valdes, WRTI Critic-at-Large