The raindrops noisily pounding the windowsill keep tempo to the music as his fingers gracefully glide across the keys. His body moves with the music, and it appears as though his mind is momentarily lost in the Bach prelude piece he is playing. Volumes of sheet music by various musicians are scattered around his office, some of them piled on the piano.

“My first degree was in civil engineering at the National Taiwan University,” said assistant professor of piano Dr. Chih-Long Hu, after he was finished playing. “My father is a civil engineer, so when I was young I was expected to do that.”

Hu’s mother, however, was a singer and taught music at an elementary school in Hu’s hometown, Tainan, Taiwan. His first memory of piano is at age 4 or 5 of him accompanying a teacher in a music class. At a young age, Hu was placed in a special class for musically talented children. He was required to play two instruments for this class and so he chose the piano and violin.

“I also studied piano privately under Tai-Cheng Chen,” he said. “He showed me how great piano music can be—the artistic life is fascinating.”

Chen will be coming to ETSU in the spring to perform in a piano recital.

During Hu’s time studying at the National Taiwan University in Taipei, he performed in many concert halls and even won some awards. “People were interested to see an engineering student beat the piano students, so I got kind of famous,” he said.

Hu eventually received his doctorate in Music Art in Piano Performance at Michigan State in 2006. But it wasn’t until after Hu obtained his bachelor’s degree in civil engineering that he decided to make music his life. “I would be making a lot of money as an engineer,” he said. “I asked myself—if I could only live my life once—I would like to do what I love.”

In the busy city of Taipei, it was difficult for Hu to find a piano to practice on. The National Taiwan University did not have any pianos for him to practice on, so sometimes he would sneak into other schools to practice. “That didn’t always work,” he said while laughing. “Sometimes I got caught and they would kick me out.”

Hu finally convinced his mother to buy him a piano, and he worked out an arrangement with a friend who owned a local music studio. They needed a piano, and Hu needed a place to put his, so when the studio was closed at night, Hu would go in and practice until 3 or 4 a.m. “I still practice in the middle of the night,” he said. 

His favorite memory playing the piano took place in San Jose, Calif. three years ago. Hu played in a music competition there and became friends with the secretary at the venue. He stayed after the competition to help her clean up. A woman came through the doors for the competition, only to learn that it had already ended. She was very upset that she missed it after taking a bus there to hear the performers. The secretary asked Hu to play for the woman, and so he sat down at the piano and played a Chopin nocturne.

“I could really feel that every note I played was received by the lady,” he said. “You don’t okay for a big crowd, you don’t play for applause, you play for one person.” Hu has kept in touch with this woman ever since through e-mail and they have become lifelong friends, he said.

Hu doesn’t share other musician’s dreams to play at Carnegie Hall one day, although he did hint that this might happen next year. Instead, he said his lifelong goal “is to be able to speak through music in a way that can be heard—and seen.” 

Hu has played in many concert halls from Europe to the United States, but he enjoys playing concerts at ETSU because of the intimacy he feels in the smaller setting. “It’s a great feeling as an artist to feel your work is appreciated.” 

Hu, who turns 33 in January, has now been teaching piano at ETSU for three years and is frequently flying around the world playing concerts. “This department allowed me a lot of freedom to grow as an artist; I play a lot of concerts,” he said.

When asked who his favorite composer is, Hu squinted his eyes and breathed in deeply. “This is a hard question,” he said before he mentioned Mozart as one of his favorites. “His music has a lot of depth to it—it’s like a diamond, you can appreciate it from every angle. Chopin is another composer that speaks very dearly to me. You can hear the sophistication in his music.”

Hu continues talking about the life of Chopin and how his personal life is reflected in his music. But then he abruptly stops to glance at the clock. He is late for a studio class and must hurry downstairs where 10 or more students are waiting for him.