MONDAY BYTES — October 17, 2016
This is a story of a voice student, mezzo Yajie Chen, who was taking an entrepreneurial career course I taught at Manhattan School of Music. And what I learned from her.
Yajie came to see me during the semester and told me she thought that young musicians in her home country, China, would benefit from a translated edition of my book, Beyond Talent. And that she wanted to be the translator.
I was of course flattered and impressed with her motivation and interest—especially as she was an undergraduate at the time!
But I warned her of the challenges involved. That finding an interested publisher might prove daunting and that the rights would need to be negotiated between the Chinese publisher and my publisher, and that translation work can take quite a long time.
I didn’t want to discourage Yajie, but I have to admit, I thought the chances of a student being able to successfully pull this off were pretty slim.
Well, Yajie sure proved me wrong. She did it!
Yajie went out and found the publisher, did an excellent translation, handled all of the communication between me, my publisher, and the Chinese publisher—and made the thing happen. All while continuing her studies! It took a number of years to arrange all of this, but she persisted and now Beyond Talent has just been released in China—I’m so excited!
Take a look:
And here’s a peek inside:
A Big Big thank you to Yajie for her vision, determination, and amazing work: BRAVA!
Lesson I learned from her: don’t ever underestimate what a creative and motivated young musician can do!
About Yajie: Mezzo Yajie Chen’s credits include performing as Suzuki (Madame Butterfly), Flora (La Traviata), Udolin (Die Verschworenen), and Rosette (Manon). Ms. Chen has participated in the Canadian Vocal Arts Institute, Montreal, as well as iSING in Suzhou, China. Having earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees at MSM, she is now a doctoral candidate in Opera studies at China East Normal University and is spending 2016-17 studying in Berlin. Beyond her performance work, Yajie also has a keen interest in assisting musicians advance in their careers and entrepreneurial projects.
Here’s to you, Yajie, terrific vocalist, emerging music career specialist, world traveler, and translator extraordinaire—my heartfelt thanks!
And a request to you, dear readers: Can you help spread the news about the Chinese edition? Do you know of any Chinese musicians who would like to take their careers to the next level? If so, please forward this to them. And here are two sites where they can purchase the book: DangDang and Tmall.
Thank you all and have a great week,
As always, I love hearing from you: questions, feedback, and ideas! Reach me at Angela@BeyondTalentConsulting.com
If you’d like to create a custom-tailored plan to move ahead in your career and life, let’s talk abut how coaching can help you. Reach me at Angela@BeyondTalentConsulting.com
Dream Big, Plan Smart, Live Well
