|
|
(Back to Piedmont News)
Hayners to premier work by Leslie Bassett in concert here Feb. 25 A piano and organ concert by Piedmont College music faculty members Phillip and Joy Hayner will feature the world premier of a composition by Pulitzer prize-winning composer Leslie Bassett. In addition to works by Schubert, Szymanowski, and Milhaud, the Hayners will perform Bassett's new composition for piano and organ, "Hammered Strings and Whistling Pipes," featuring the 3,675-pipe Sewell Organ. The concert will be held at 7:30 p.m., Feb. 25, in the Center for Worship and Music at Piedmont's main campus in Demorest. Admission is free and the public is invited. Prior to the concert, Bassett will present a short talk about his work beginning at 6:30 p.m. in Brooks Hall. Bassett, an emeritus professor of music at the University of Michigan now living in Hall County, has won numerous national and international awards for his compositions. After studying in Paris as a Fulbright Fellow in 1951, he was awarded the annual Prix de Rome scholarship three times. In 1966 he won the Pulitzer Prize in Music for his "Variations for Orchestra," which had premiered in Rome in 1963 by the RAI Symphony Orchestra under Feruccio Scaglia, followed two years later by the Philadelphia Orchestra’s U.S. premiere under Eugene Ormandy. Born in Hanford, Calif., Bassett is also a two-time Guggenheim Fellowship recipient in 1971 and 1991, and his compositions have been performed by orchestras around the world. He was awarded the major composer award and membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters and has twice been composer-in-residence at the Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Center. "We are happy to premiere professor Bassett's composition for piano and organ," Phillip Hayner said. "The genre of piano and organ is not one for which there are many pieces of art music. This piece was commissioned for us as a gift by the music faculty at Toccoa Falls College, and we have wanted to do it for several years. Professor Bassett is one of the fine composers of his generation, and he proves in this piece that he still has plenty to say that is unique and creative. Especially appealing is his interest in beautiful and unique harmonies. We hope to give as good a reading as we can, and we hope the audience will truly enjoy and appreciate this fine piece of music." In addition to "Hammered Strings," the Hayners will perform Schubert's "Fantasy in F minor" for four-hand piano, "Scaramouche" by Milhaud for duo piano, and organ and piano solos. Phillip Hayner is a professor of music at Piedmont, where he teaches piano, music history, church music, music theory, and accompanying. Prior to coming to Piedmont in 2003, he served as music executive at Toccoa Falls College. He has been active as a composer, pianist, teacher, conductor, and church music director. Joy Hayner is organist at Covenant Congregational Church in Demorest and has recently been appointed to the faculty at Piedmont. She has held positions at Pensacola Christian School, Toccoa Falls College, Truett-McConnell College and First United Methodist Church in Toccoa. She has performed as soloist on both organ and piano and in ensemble with various musical groups and musicians in the northeast Georgia area, including the Toccoa symphony and the Columbia, S.C., Philharmonic Orchestra. -30- |
Composer Leslie Bassett,
left, goes over the score of his new composition "Hammered Strings and Whistling
Pipes," with Phillip and Joy Hayner during a rehearsal at the Piedmont College
Center for Worship and Music. 