The American Piano Quartet will perform Tuesday, Sept. 29, in the de Jong Concert Hall at 7:30 p.m. The group consists of Brigham Young University School of Music faculty artists Jeffrey Shumway, Robin Hancock and Scott Holden and guest artist Paul Pollei.
Tickets are available through the Fine Arts Ticket Office, (801) 422-4277 or at byuarts.com.
They will perform arrangements of the “Grand Galop Chromatique” by Franz Liszt and the “Slavonic Dances,” op. 46 by Antonin Dvorak as well as a “Ragtime Medley” by Robert Bailey. They will also perform Holden’s arrangement of “The Sardar’s Procession” by Michail Ippolitov-Ivanov and two arrangements by former quartet member Mack Wilberg, the “Sicilienne” by Johann Sebastian Bach and a Fantasy on Themes from “Carmen.”
The quartet began in 1984 when Pollei received a piece of music from a student’s grandmother designed for four pianists. The quartet performed the piece and were so well received that they decided to continue as a group. They have since performed across the world.
Shumway is the head of keyboard studies at BYU and is involved in performing groups including the American Piano Duo and the Deseret Piano Trio. Hancock is also a professor of keyboard studies at BYU. He previously taught at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth. Holden, chair of piano and organ studies at BYU, was educated at the University of Michigan before obtaining his master’s degree from the Juilliard School of Music in 1995.
Paul Pollei is a former faculty member at BYU and is the founder of the American Piano Quartet and the Gina Bachauer International Piano Foundation, which sponsors competitions and festivals. Pollei has served as a jury member for many national and international competitions.
For more information regarding the performance, contact Ken Crossley at (801) 422-9348.
Writer: Brandon Garrett
