(WILSON, N.C.) The Barton College/Wilson Symphony Orchestra will present its Fall Concert on Sunday, Nov. 18 at 3 p.m. in Howard Chapel on the college campus. The orchestra, under the direction of conductor Mark N. Peterson, continues its 2007-2008 season in grand fashion featuring internationally acclaimed pianist Jeremy Thompson for a performance of Tchaikovsky’s “Piano Concerto No. 1.”
Born in Dipper Harbour, New Brunswick, Dr. Thompson earned his doctorate in piano performance from the prestigious McGill University in Montreal where he studied with the renowned pianist Marina Mdivani. Dr. Thompson has a vast and varied repertoire of virtuosic piano music; however, he maintains a strong interest in contemporary Canadian composers. As an orchestral soloist and recitalist, he has played in the Rachmaninoff Hall of Moscow Conservatory, the Great Hall of the Tbilisi Conservatory, the Glinka Hall of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, and throughout North America.
Tchaikovsky’s first Piano Concerto has been a favorite standard of the concert repertoire since its triumphant 1874 debut in Boston. The work was originally composed for the Russian virtuoso Nicolai Rubenstein who requested numerous changes from Tchaikovsky, dismissing the piece as “banal, clumsy and incompetently written.” Fortunately, the composer ignored these suggestions, and it was given its premier with the celebrated German pianist and conductor Hans von Bülow, an avowed Tchaikovsky fan. This concerto is still remembered as the pieced Van Cliburn played at the height of the Cold War in 1958 to win the first Tchaikovsky competition.
The orchestra will also be performing Beethoven’s dramatic “Egmont Overture” and several of Dvorak’s passionate “Slavonic Dances.”
The Fall Concert will be the second performance of the Barton College/Wilson Symphony Orchestra’s 2007-2008 season, which follows on the heels of an enormously successful “Symphony and Soul” event in early fall with special guest soloist Leonard Rowe. He enthralled the audience with his performances of “I got plenty of nottin’” from “Porgy and Bess” and “Some Enchanted Evening” from “South Pacific.”
During spring semester 2008, the Barton College/Wilson Symphony Orchestra’s will perform its annual Valentine dinner concert on Thursday, Feb. 14, at the “Love the Symphony” Gala with guest pianist Eric Mazonson, and will conclude its season on Sunday, May 4, at the Spring Concert featuring the talent of Robert Burkett, the symphony’s principal oboist.
Following this upcoming concert, the audience is cordially invited to meet the musicians at a reception in the Barton Art Museum hosted by ARAMARK Higher Education. Admission for the fall orchestra performance will be $10 at the door or by season ticket. All students within the community will be admitted free of charge as well as faculty, staff and students of Barton College. For additional information, please contact Lynne Medlin at 252-399-6309 or email: lmedlin@barton.edu.
Questions? Please contact Kathy Daughety, director of public relations, at 252-399-6529 or email: kdaughety@barton.edu.