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Vivian Chen

Musical masterpieces might strike chords in the soft corners of Perry So Pak-hin's heart, but it was Anna Graber who touched his soul.
Perry, 29, is the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra's associate conductor. Anna, 25, is pursuing her PhD in Russian history at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. They were married in New Haven on July 30 and will throw a party celebrating their marriage in Hong Kong on November 24. 
The two met at Yale in 2004 when Anna, a cellist, auditioned for a spot in the school orchestra, which Perry directed. She beat 20 other candidates. 
'That year was very intense, but I have to say that the decision was totally impartial,' said Perry, laughing. 
Love gradually grew as the pair spent more and more time together during and after the rehearsals. 
'We got to know each other musically, and also we were very good friends,' he said. 'We just spent a lot of time hanging out.'
When they met, Anna was a first-year student and Perry was about to graduate. The last week before graduation, he asked Anna to be his girlfriend. 
'We know that we both really love to be with musicians because music is a very important part of our life. We played a lot of music together, and it was a very intimate thing,' said Perry. 'Also she's the most optimistic and infectiously happy person I know, so I've always been attracted to her as a person.' 
Anna's first reaction to Perry's confession of love was to joke about whether it was an authority thing since Perry was her conductor. 
Their relationship didn't pick up instantly since Perry moved to Baltimore to study for his postgraduate degree. In fact, in the six years they dated, the couple barely lived together, and that caused a little friction.
'Yeah, for a while it was a bit rocky,' Perry said. 'We've been sort of on and off. But less than a year after that I decided I was going to make an effort to make it serious.'
For the first few years, they got to see each other only once every three months, but they survived the long-distance blues. 
'I knew she was the one because, even on different continents, we were still on the same wavelength,' he said. 'She truly understands me and is a musician, so she understands a lot of being an artist.
'We see each other as not only romantic or familiar companions, but also intellectual companions. She's really honest and straightforward about my conducting. It's great. I mean I don't want someone to always tell me that I'm doing great.
'She's the good catch, not me. Anna is like a saint. She's so patient and forgiving about career, all the travelling and the uncertainty. She's taught me to have patience and not force things to happen.' 
Perry proposed to Anna in July last year in Celle,  an old town in Germany. Perry went to the Netherlands for a concert and the two met up there and decided to rent a car and spend some time in the German countryside. 
'I had plans to go to this really beautiful village. I loved the beautiful gardens there when I last visited it in college. I thought it would be such a nice place to propose,' he said. 
There weren't any cheesy set-ups or dramas involved in Perry's proposal. 'I could have come up with a more well-defined, 10-stage plan, but I'm glad how the whole thing unfolded,' he said. 'We wanted it to be something very sweet, nothing overly spectacular.'
Now, even though they're married, Perry's globe-trotting schedule and Anna's dissertation will still keep them apart a while longer, but he said neither seems to mind too much. 
'What Anna and I found over the years is that despite all the distance, we still managed to stay very, very close,' he said. 'In fact, I feel we are getting closer and closer. We love the challenge, and we both see it as an adventure.'
She's the good catch, not me. Anna is like a saint. She's so patient and forgiving
Perry So Pak-hin



A musical union to tug the strings