Contact: Dr. Valerie Cisler, professor of music and performing arts, 308-865-8118, cislerv@unk.edu
Kearney, Neb., April 10, 2013 – The 44th Annual Spring Piano Workshop is set for April 13, at the University of Nebraska at Kearney.
The Spring Piano Workshop includes master classes, recitals and workshop sessions focused on historical, technical, cultural, creative and interpretive aspects of piano performance and teaching. In addition, student participants have the opportunity to work with UNK piano faculty members in smaller master class sessions in preparation for recitals, auditions and competitions.
The workshop is open to all students from grades 7-12 and collegiate, teachers and parents. This year’s workshop will feature guest artist/ clinician Marvin Blickenstaff, who will present a series of sessions on piano performance, practice and interpretation. Piano Faculty Master Classes wil be given by Nathan Buckner, Valerie Cisler and James Cook.
The final workshop, ‘Chopin’s Preludes,’ will provide historical background to the preludes and discuss the various ways in which Chopin brings both unity and variety to the complete set of 24 preludes, said Valerie Cisler, UNK professor of music and performing arts. “A few of the Chopin preludes are standards in the teaching literature, we teach them individually but have little opportunity to consider Opus 28 as a whole,” she said.
“Marvin Blickenstaff is one of the preeminent pedagogues in the country,” Cisler said. “We have been trying to bring him to the UNK campus for the past six years and, luckily, he happened to be available for the 2013 workshop.”
Blickenstaff has led hundreds of workshops for pianists and piano teachers throughout the world and is a frequent presenter at regional and state conventions of music teachers and for the national conference of the Music Teachers National Association. For 16 summers he was on the faculty of the International Workshops where he performed and lectured in Canada, Austria, Scotland, Norway, France and Switzerland.
For more information or to register, contact Valerie Cisler at cislerv@unk.edu, or 308-865-8118.
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-Caitlin Ostberg
