It's been a busy March as noted by our previous blog post that I would recommend perusing if you are new around here: https://www.kiserpiano.com/post/march-music-madness.
And a busy April:
So summer is around the corner and the students have been mostly assigned new repertoire for next season. This is always an interesting process for us, most of the music we assign we've played before but we are expanding our horizons and picking exciting and sometimes, quite difficult, music.
These pictures are from the SCMTA winners recital. Congrats to Nathan, Bryan, Andrew, Roger, and of course the many alternate winners (full list at bottom of post).
Let's keep the pictures coming: Henry Sun is below at the Peace Center for the GCYO concert. He assisted the Prelude Ensemble.
Lisa and I had the honor of judging Georgia's state wide competition GMTA. We were just so impressed with the talent and dedication of the students. Congratulations to the winners from my room, you certainly deserved it. Also the overall organization and the host site were just spectacular. Brand new Steinway pianos and...I say this not jokingly...Scotts branded paper towels in the bathroom. I liked the all glass door practice rooms. The location, as I mentioned, was just lovely, in the Northwest Georgia hills, called Piedmont University.
A big congratulations to the winners and participants from our studio in the Asheville Area Piano Forum piano competition that's open to participants from three surrounding states. Another well organized and ran competition with smiling, friendly people, and a proper honors recital. Not pictured is Roger. Lisa's students won first prize in every category except one. We had so much fun just hanging out waiting for the announcement. One thing I'm quite proud of in the studio is the friendship among our students (and no less a bit of friendly competition). There was a real sense of community that I was grateful for. Usually competitions mean sitting alone, or with your family, looking suspiciously at the other students. One reason we have such a community is the parents regularly attend our frequent mini recitals. And our students stay and play with Eleanor or just hang out (that might mean recording on the Steinway or practicing). The location was the beautiful campus of Mars Hill University and its chapel, which functioned as a very good recital space with a Steinway D. (It is unfortunate that the main rural thoroughfare cut straight through the campus, with diesel trucks pulling farming implements. Ah well).
A big congratulations to our Crescent Club winners. The club does a great job making sure there are opportunities for local students. Without them there wouldn't be a piano playing scene here in Greenville. You've made it this far. Here are the complete winner lists:
SCMTA Winner Lists and NFMC Best Performers:
And also a big congrats to Henry and Andrew who were chosen to participate in Piccolo Spoleto Rising Stars:
Lisa had a busy performing season. One of note was the Artists Up Close concert at the Fine Arts Center.She joined the concertmaster and principal cellist of the Greenville Symphony Mary Lee Kinosian and Seth Russell to give just a stupendous and powerful rendition of Shostakovich piano trio in e minor among other things. I hope they play more together. I would pay for it! Sorry for the grainy pic from the same concert:
Getting near the end. Here are a few more pics I forgot to add up top. Can you spot the chicken. It was free range and had cried Bach...(srry). I thought it was a nice touch at the Asheville competition that they put the judge bios and pictures up for all to see. Kudos to Olyvvia and Henry for their senior care home recitals that they put on this semester as noted in previous posts.
Ahh yes the Crescent pic. With two exceptions it was "studio recital". We are so proud of our students.
Thanks for reading and have a good summer, make sure to practice hard, but not that hard.
-David
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