Pianist Liza Stepanova
Tones & Colors
Saturday, Jan. 6th – 7pm
Tickets
About the Show
Classical
Pianist Liza Stepanova, praised by The New York Times for her “thoughtful musicality” and “fleet-fingered panache,” celebrates the release of her new album, Tones & Colors (CAG Records), with this concert at National Sawdust. The album, recorded by acclaimed producer and National Sawdust Curator Adam Abeshouse, will be available at the concert on January 6 and at all major retailers on January 19.
Tones & Colors showcases the cross-pollination between visual and aural media through 13 pieces of music, spanning the centuries between Bach and Ligeti and featuring music by composers including Enrique Granados, Maurice Ohana, Joaquín Turina, Fanny Hensel, Bohuslav Martinů, Claude Debussy, Johann Sebastian Bach, George Crumb, György Ligeti, Lyonel Feininger, and Leopold Godowsky, each paired with a painting, drawing, or sculpture. Stepanova will perform selections from the album at National Sawdust.
On the genesis of Tones & Colors, Liza Stepanova says, “This has been a project long in the making. I have had an interest in visual art ever since traveling Europe as a child and going to the wonderful museums in Germany, France, and Italy. Later, by playing musical works that were obviously connected to art (Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition and Poulenc’s Work of a Painter songs), I became more interested in the intersections between art and music and went on to curate recitals exploring these connections for my then-ensemble, SongFusion, and various summer festivals. In 2010, I traveled to Germany on a Juilliard grant to study the works of the Mendelssohn siblings and became aware of the unique illustrated manuscript of Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel’s piano cycle The Year, with vignettes by her husband, painter Wilhelm Hensel. One of the musical months from this cycle, ‘September,’ is featured on this recording.”
About Liza Stepanova
Liza Stepanova
Praised by The New York Times for her “thoughtful musicality” and “fleet-fingered panache,” Liza Stepanova is in demand as a soloist, collaborator, and educator. She has performed extensively in Europe, most recently, as a soloist with the Southwest-German Philharmonic and in chamber music performances at the Berlin Museum of Musical Instruments and Belgrade’s Kolarac Hall. In the United States, she has appeared in Carnegie Hall’s Weill and Zankel Halls, Alice Tully Hall, Merkin Concert Hall, and Steinway Hall in New York City; at the Kennedy Center and The Smithsonian in Washington, DC; and live on WQXR New York, WFMT Chicago, and WETA Washington, DC. Stepanova has twice been a soloist with the Juilliard Orchestra led by James DePreist and Nicholas McGegan and was a top prizewinner at the Liszt-Garrison, Juilliard Concerto, Steinway, and Ettlingen competitions.
As a member of the Lysander Piano Trio, she won the 2012 Concert Artists Guild Competition and received the Grand Prize at the 2011 Coleman Competition. The Trio gave its Kaufman Center and Weill Hall recital debuts in 2014 to enthusiastic reviews, has commissioned two world premieres, and recently released its debut CD After A Dream, which garnered positive reviews from The New York Times’ Classical Playlist, WQXR, and Minnesota Public Radio.
The 2017-2018 season will see the release of Stepanova’s first solo piano CD, Tones & Colors, recorded in New York City with Grammy Award-winning producer Adam Abeshouse. The recording features music from Bach to Ligeti that was inspired by visual art. Other season highlights include an Albany Records release featuring world premiere recordings of chamber music by composer Tom Cipullo, solo recitals in Atlanta, Minneapolis, San Francisco, and New York City, a residency at the University of North Texas, and chamber music performances at the Resonant Bodies Festival in New York City, Princeton University Summer Concerts, and at the Kravis Center for the Performing Arts in Palm Beach.
Stepanova has performed as a soloist and chamber musician at international festivals at Castleton, La Jolla, Music@Menlo, Mostly Mozart, Copenhagen (Denmark), and Davos (Switzerland), where she had opportunities to collaborate with leading artists including violinist Cho-Liang Lin, violist James Dunham, clarinetist Charles Neidich, soprano Lucy Shelton, mezzo-soprano Susanne Mentzer and members of the Berlin Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, and the Atlanta Symphony. Deeply committed to new music, she has premiered works by Jennifer Higdon and Libby Larsen and worked with composers William Bolcom, Gabriela Lena Frank, and John Harbison.
Liza Stepanova studied art song collaboration with Wolfram Rieger in Berlin and was invited by the late Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau to perform in several of his masterclasses including the Hugo-Wolf-Tage festival in Austria. Since 2010, Stepanova has been on the faculty at SongFest at The Colburn School in Los Angeles and also served as the festival’s Associate Artistic Director and Piano Program Director for two years.
Stepanova received her DMA from The Juilliard School with a Richard F. French Award for outstanding doctoral work. Previously a graduate of the Hanns Eisler Academy in Berlin, Germany, she studied with Joseph Kalichstein, Seymour Lipkin, Jerome Lowenthal, and George Sava, and performed in masterclasses for Alfred Brendel, Daniel Barenboim and András Schiff. Following teaching positions at The Juilliard School and Smith College, she is currently an assistant professor of piano at the University of Georgia, Hugh Hodgson School of Music.
For more information about Liza Stepanova, please visit www.liza-stepanova.com.
