CHICAGO–(ENEWSPF)–October 15, 2014. Roosevelt University will present a Showcase Recital featuring performances by some of the finest student pianists at Chicago College of Performing Arts (CCPA), as the sixth annual, four-night PianoFest celebration opens at the University on Monday, October 20.
The festival’s opening night recital, which is free and open to the public, will be held at 7:30 p.m. in Roosevelt’s seventh-floor Ganz Hall, 430 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago. The evening will include performances by six CCPA student pianists, including four who are international students from China.
“This will be an opportunity for the public to see and hear some of the finest talent from our piano program, which has a world-renowned faculty and a growing body of international students,” said Winston Choi, director of the University’s Piano Program and organizer of PianoFest.
Information about all of the performances and programs that are free and open to the public on Oct. 20, 21, 22 and 24 at Ganz Hall can be found at www.roosevelt.edu/ccpa or by calling 312-341-2238.
Student performers and their programs include:
Mizi Li. a first-year graduate student at Roosevelt and 2010 graduate of The Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing. She was Gold Medalist at the 3rd Wiesbaden International Piano Contest in Germany and won First Prize in the senior division of the Fifth Asian Youth Music Competition in Beijing and Second Prize in the fifth group of the Academy Cup in Memory of the 150th Anniversary of Debussy’s Birth Competition. She studies with CCPA piano faculty member Winston Choi. Li will perform Johannes Brahms’ Intermezzi, Op. 117.
Tong Liu, a native of China who began piano studies at seven years of age and was admitted to The Middle School of the Shenyang Conservatory of Music in 2003. He won prizes at the 2003 Schumann International Piano Competition in China and was chosen in 2014 as a fellow of the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival. Liu received a bachelor’s degree in Music from Roosevelt University in May 2014. A student of piano faculty member Adam Neiman, he is currently a first-year Master of Music student. Liu will perform the first movement of Franz Schubert’s Sonata, D 960.
Stephen Uhl, a second-year graduate student and resident of Bensenville, Ill. Winner of the Lucile Stansberry-Rosholt Award for Distinction in Collaborative Piano, Uhl has a gift for collaborating with musicians and singers. He currently is the recipient of CCPA’s Collaborative Piano Assistantship, taking part in performances by dozens of musicians and singers at Roosevelt. Uhl has premiered a student composition commissioned by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in New York and is the organist and assistant cantor at Prince of Peace Lutheran Church in Schaumburg. He will perform the third movement from Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Sonata, Op. 109.
Allison Wang was born in Taiwan and grew up in Menominee Falls, Wis. An undergraduate, she has been playing the piano for 13 years and the alto sax since eighth grade. Wang was winner of the 2012 Menominee Falls High School Concerto Competition, winner of the 2012 Waukesha Area Symphonic Band Concerto Competition and placed fourth in the Chopin Youth Piano Competition in 2010. She studies with CCPA faculty member Ludmila Lazar. Wang will perform three of Bela Bartok’s Dances in Bulgarian Rhythm and the opening movement of Faschingsschwank aus Wien.
Li Wang is a native of China’s Inner Mongolia who began piano studies at the age of four. In 2004, she was admitted to the Middle School of the Shenyang Conservatory of Music. In 2007, she received Third Prize in the national Kawai Piano Competition in China and in 2010 she was admitted to the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, where she received a bachelor’s degree in Music. A Master’s of Music student at Roosevelt, Wang studies with CCPA piano faculty member Adam Neiman. She will perform the first and second movements from Frederic Chopin’s Sonata No. 2.
Kaiming Yu is a native of China and an undergraduate who previously studied at the Shenyang Conservatory of Music. He has performed extensively throughout China and was a finalist in the CCTV Piano and Violin Competition, which is seen by millions of TV viewers in China. Yu’s recent performances include the Mostly Music Chicago concert series. He studies with CCPA piano faculty member Winston Choi. Yu will perform George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue.
Source: roosevelt.edu