FORT WORTH, Texas, March 16, 2016—The Cliburn presents pianist Garrick Ohlsson in concert on Tuesday, April 5, 2016, at 7:30 p.m. CDT at Bass Performance Hall in Fort Worth, Texas. In this season-closing concert, Ohlsson will perform works by Beethoven, Schubert, and Chopin. Full program listed below.
Tickets to attend in person are still available, and range in price from $20 to $65. They can be purchased online at Cliburn.org, by calling 817.212.4280, or at the Bass Hall Box Office (525 Commerce Street, Fort Worth, TX).
Part of the CLIBURN LIVE program, the concert will be streamed live in its entirety at Cliburn.org, and will be made available for on-demand viewing within one week, pending artist approval.
Over a four-year period, CLIBURN LIVE webcasts over 250 performances live and on demand to the world—all three competitions (Amateur in June 2016, Cliburn in May/June 2017, and Junior in June 2019) and select Cliburn Concerts by some of the world’s top performing musicians (2-3 annually).
“The Cliburn’s mission is to share classical music with the widest audience possible,” said Jacques Marquis, president and CEO. “The viewership of the competition webcasts has grown exponentially every four years and is an extremely valuable tool to fulfilling that mandate. We have an expertise in broadcasting live concerts online and are presenting the finest artists annually in Fort Worth. It’s a natural extension to showcase Cliburn Concerts internationally as well—and a way to bring people from across the world to the Cliburn much more often.”
The Cliburn’s history of webcasting spans 14 years and has included four Van Cliburn International Piano Competitions from Bass Hall (2001, 2005, 2009, 2013), one Cliburn International Amateur Piano Competition from TCU (2011), the Van Cliburn Memorial Concert from Sundance Square Plaza (2014), and the Cliburn International Junior Piano Competition and Festival (2015). This concert will be the fourth Cliburn Concert webcast: Previous concerts included Beatrice Rana (September 2014), the John Giordano Tribute (April 2015), and Marc-André Hamelin (October 2015).
GARRICK OHLSSON PROGRAM
BEETHOVEN Sonata No. 31 in A-flat Major, op. 110
SCHUBERT Fantasy in C Major, D. 760 (“Der Wanderer”)
CHOPIN
Scherzo No. 4 in E Major, op. 54
Etude in E Minor, op. 25, no. 5
Etude in G-sharp Minor, op. 25, no. 6
Nocturne in C Minor, op. 48, no. 1
Ballade No. 1 in G Minor, op. 23
ABOUT THE ARTIST
GARRICK OHLSSON, PIANO
Since his triumph as winner of the 1970 Chopin International Piano Competition, pianist Garrick Ohlsson has established himself worldwide as a musician of magisterial interpretive and technical prowess. Although long regarded as one of the world’s leading exponents of the music of Frédéric Chopin, Mr. Ohlsson commands an enormous repertoire, which ranges over the entire piano literature. A student of the late Claudio Arrau, Mr. Ohlsson has come to be noted for his masterly performances of the works of Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert, as well as the Romantic repertoire. To date he has at his command more than 80 concertos, ranging from Haydn and Mozart to works of the 21st century, many commissioned for him.
The 2015-2016 season includes recitals in Berkeley, New York, Indianapolis, Brisbane, Seattle, La Jolla, Evanston, Lincoln, and Costa Mesa. In return visits to Australia, he will appear in Perth, Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, and Adelaide and, for the first time, with the New Zealand Symphony in Wellington and Auckland. With concerti as diverse as Beethoven, Brahms, Barber, and Busoni, he can be heard with orchestras in Boston, Los Angeles, Ottawa, Nashville, Indianapolis, Oregon, Warsaw, St. Petersburg, Manchester (United Kingdom), and Lugano. In the fall, he served as a judge at the 17th International Fryderyk Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw, and in April he will join the Takács Quartet for a brief East Coast tour culminating at Carnegie Hall.
An avid chamber musician, Mr. Ohlsson has collaborated with the Cleveland, Emerson, and Tokyo String Quartets, among other ensembles. Together with violinist Jorja Fleezanis and cellist Michael Grebanier, he is a founding member of the San Francisco-based FOG Trio. Passionate about singing and singers, Mr. Ohlsson has appeared in recital with such legendary artists as Magda Olivero, Jessye Norman, and Ewa Podles.
A native of White Plains, New York, Garrick Ohlsson began his piano studies at the age of 8, at the Westchester Conservatory of Music; at 13 he entered The Juilliard School, in New York City. His musical development has been influenced in completely different ways by a succession of distinguished teachers, most notably Claudio Arrau, Olga Barabini, Tom Lishman, Sascha Gorodnitzki, Rosina Lhévinne, and Irma Wolpe. Although he won First Prizes at the 1966 Busoni Competition in Italy and the 1968 Montréal Piano Competition, it was his 1970 triumph at the International Chopin Competition in Warsaw, where he won the gold medal (and remains the single American to have done so), that brought him worldwide recognition as one of the finest pianists of his generation. Since then, he has made nearly a dozen tours of Poland, where he retains immense personal popularity. Mr. Ohlsson was awarded the Avery Fisher Prize in 1994 and received the 1998 University Musical Society Distinguished Artist Award in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He is also the 2014 recipient of the Jean Gimbel Lane Prize in Piano Performance from the Northwestern University Bienen School of Music. He makes his home in San Francisco.
ABOUT THE CLIBURN
The Cliburn advances classical piano music throughout the world. Its international competitions, education programs, and concert series embody an enduring commitment to artistic excellence and the discovery of new artists. Established in 1962, the quadrennial Van Cliburn International Piano Competition is widely-recognized as “one of the world’s highest-visibility classical-music contests” (Dallas Morning News) and remains committed to its original ideals of supporting and launching the careers of young pianists, age 18 to 30 (fifteenth edition May 25–June 10, 2017). It shares the transformative powers of music with a wide global audience, through fully-produced webcasts and by providing commission-free, comprehensive career management and concert bookings to its winners. Rounding out its mission, the Cliburn also produces the Cliburn International Junior Piano Competition and Festival for exceptional 13 to 17-year-old pianists (inaugural edition June 21–28, 2015; second edition 2019), and the Cliburn International Amateur Piano Competition for outstanding non-professional pianists age 35 and older (seventh edition June 19–25, 2016).
Over a four-year cycle, the Cliburn contributes to North Texas’ cultural landscape with over 170 classical music performances for 150,000 attendees, through competitions, free community concerts, and its signature Cliburn Concerts series at Bass Performance Hall, the Kimbell Art Museum Piano Pavilion, and the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. It presents 1,000 in-school, interactive music education programs for more than 200,000 area elementary students. During the same time period, it garners the world’s attention with over one million visits from 155 nations for live concert and competition webcasts; 300 concerts worldwide booked for competition winners; more than 5,000 news articles about the Cliburn and its winners; regular national radio broadcasts to 245 public radio stations; and a PBS documentary airing in a potential 105 million households. Detailed information about the Cliburn and its programs is available at Cliburn.org.
Cliburn Sponsors are:
Amon G. Carter Foundation
Arts Council of Fort Worth
Crystelle Waggoner Charitable Trust
The Pangburn Foundation, J.P. Morgan, Trustee
ExxonMobil / XTO Energy
Mercedes T. Bass Charitable Corporation
Sid W. Richardson Foundation
Exclusive Print Media Sponsor:
Star-Telegram
Official Piano of the Cliburn:
Steinway & Sons – North Texas / Houston
Official Hotel of the Cliburn:
Worthington Renaissance Fort Worth Hotel
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