Carnegie Mellon University

School of Music

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Sheet Muisc

October 30, 2011

SOM CELEBRATES CHOPIN’S BICENTENNIAL WITH WEEKEND OF PERFORMANCES

Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Music celebrates the bicentennial of Frederic Chopin’s birth with a two-day piano extravaganza from noon to 10 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 30 and Sunday, Oct. 31 in the Kresge Theatre in the College of Fine Arts building.
The event, titled “Celebrating Chopin’s Bicentennial,” will include a screening of the award-winning PBS documentary “Note By Note,” which chronicles the manufacturing process of a Steinway concert grand piano, generously donated by Trombino Piano Gallerie for this two-day event. The screening will be followed by a multitude of performances on the film’s featured piano by students and faculty members from the School of Music, CMU’s Music Preparatory School and other guest artists. “Celebrating Chopin’s Bicentennial” is co-sponsored by Trombino Piano Gallerie and the Steinway Society of Western Pennsylvania.

Performances by faculty members Mark Carver, Nancy Goeres, Enrique Graf, Luz Manriquez, Michael Rusinek and Anne Martindale Williams will headline the evening concerts. Jim Cunningham, host of the Morning Show on WQED-FM, will serve as emcee for the Oct. 30 evening concert.

Admission is free and open to the public; donations will be accepted. During the event, the school will launch a fundraising drive for a new Steinway concert grand piano. Donors can sponsor a student performer by making a donation on their behalf, or purchase a virtual part of the piano that will be recognized on the School of Music’s website. 

“Pianos are the backbone of every school of music,” said Noel Zahler, head of the School of Music. “We are fortunate to be one of nation’s few All-Steinway Schools, but with this prestigious designation comes a responsibility to provide only the best, and to maintain the instruments we already have for generations of musicians to come. We’re so pleased to have the involvement of so many talented students and faculty members, and very much look forward to meeting — or exceeding — our goal.”

Carnegie Mellon’s School of Music educates outstanding, intellectually gifted musicians through excellence in performance, creativity, scholarship and pedagogy. The School of Music offers undergraduate degrees in music composition, music and technology, and instrumental, vocal and keyboard performance. Graduate degrees are offered in composition, conducting, performance, music and technology, and music education. The school also offers a variety of highly acclaimed non-degree programs, such as the Artist Diploma Program and the Dalcroze Eurhythmics, Piano Pedagogy, Collaborative Piano, Advanced Instrumental Studies, Advanced Vocal Studies, Orff Schulwerk and Music Education certificate programs.