Daily Inspiration: Meet Neo-Art Piano Duo

Today we’d like to introduce you to Neo-Art Piano Duo.

Hi Neo-Art, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, you could tell our readers some of your backstories.
REGINA: Thank you for having us. My name is Regina Tanujaya, and I am here today with my duo partner, Matteo Generani. We are the Neo-Art Piano Duo. We chose the name Neo-Art because we always want to bring something new to our audiences, we want to try new ways to perform, and we want also to create new music. While Neo-Art Piano Duo is based in Kansas City, MO, I am from Indonesia, and Matteo is from Italy. We first met while pursuing our doctorate at the University of Missouri – Kansas City. We studied with the same professor, Alon Goldstein, an incredible mentor and inspiration to both of us.

MATTEO: Regina and I started playing together in 2018, mainly just for fun and occasionally to perform together as an addition to our solo performances. After realizing how well we worked together, we officially formed the Neo-Art Piano Duo in 2022 and performed professionally. Since 2018, we have performed together on many occasions in Kansas City, from outreach performances in retirement homes to bigger concerts at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts. So far, we have performed locally in Kansas City. Recently, the Emerald Coast Music Alliance Foundation invited us as guest artists for a 10-day residency to perform concerts in Florida.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
REGINA: We are very fortunate that we have been enjoying every moment of our work together. This is probably thanks to Matteo, and I am becoming friends since we met, mainly due to our similar personalities, sense of humor, and love for music. We are a relatively new group and have been having a blast working together.

MATTEO: One challenging thing is that it is quite difficult to find rehearsal times together since we both also have solo careers and independent work schedules. When we have to prepare for a performance, a big portion of the preparation is done individually, and only three weeks before a concert, we meet together to rehearse. The fun part is realizing how little space you have when playing with another pianist sitting next to you compared to practicing alone.

REGINA: You also realize how busy the keyboard becomes. We spent a lot of time trying to figure out who would play with their “elbows out” and who will play “under” the arm of the other. It’s quite fun to work together on these things because they are things that we don’t have to deal with when we perform individually as solo pianists. As solo pianists, we work alone a lot. So, just the fact that we get to work together, even when we have to meet very late at night after we worked all day, overcomes all the hardship.

MATTEO: As Regina mentioned, we are very fortunate to work together so that even dealing with more mundane tasks, such as emailing, selecting repertoire, marketing, and social media management, becomes pleasant. We have had positive and productive teamwork.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
The Neo-Art Piano Duo is very flexible with our programming, and we play repertoires for four hands (on one piano) and two pianos. We want to be versatile, and we offer unique and interesting performances. We mainly perform classical music but can easily expand our genres depending on our interests. As a duo, we also make our arrangements of pieces we love. We also experimented with putting some theatrics into our piano performances. Our interest has been to perform pieces, usually for larger ensembles or the orchestra, in more venues and to be more accessible to larger audiences. As a piano duo, we can condense a large-scale work to be heard by performing on one piano. This has benefitted smaller venues or facilities without a big budget, as bringing an entire orchestra to them is challenging. In the future, we want to collaborate with different artists and create multidisciplinary events or performances.

Before we go, can you talk to us about how people can work, collaborate, or support you?
The biggest support we could ask for is recognition of our work and performance. We always post updates on our projects and performances on social media (Instagram and Facebook). We also would love to be more involved in the music and arts scene in Kansas City, and we are always open to ideas and exploring other genres/types of performances. We would be very grateful if people would watch and share our performances. Anyone can contact us through email and social media for performing and collaboration inquiries.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/neoartpianoduo/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/neoartpianoduo
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@neoartpianoduo