Faculty Recital: Stephen Drury, Piano

NEC: Jordan Hall | Directions

290 Huntington Ave.
Boston, MA
United States

Stephen Drury has given performances throughout the U.S., Europe, Asia, and Latin America, soloing with orchestras from San Diego to Bucharest. A prize winner in several competitions, including the Concert Artists Guild, Affiliate Artists, and Carnegie Hall/Rockefeller competitions, his repertoire stretches from Bach, Mozart, and Liszt to the music of today.
         U.S. State Department sponsored two concert tours that enabled him to take the sounds of dissonance to Paris, Hong Kong, Greenland, Pakistan, Prague, and Japan. He has appeared as conductor and pianist at the Angelica Festival in Italy, the MusikTriennale Köln in Germany, the Spoleto Festival USA, the Britten Sinfonia in England, as well as at Tonic, Roulette, and the Knitting Factory in New York. Drury has also performed with Merce Cunningham and Mikhail Barishnikov in the Lincoln Center Festival, at Alice Tully Hall as part of the Great Day in New York Festival, with the Boston Symphony Chamber Players, and with the Seattle Chamber Players in Seattle and Moscow.

        A champion of 20th-century music, Drury’s critically acclaimed performances range from the piano sonatas of Charles Ives to works by John Cage and György Ligeti. He premiered the solo part of John Cage’s 101 with the BSO and gave the first performance of John Zorn’s concerto for piano and orchestra Aporias with Dennis Russell Davies and the Cologne Radio Symphony. He has commissioned new works from Cage, Zorn, Terry Riley, Lee Hyla, and Chinary Ung,
       Drury has given masterclasses at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, Oberlin Conservatory, Mannes Beethoven Insitute and throughout the world, and served on juries for the Concert Artist Guild and Orléans Concours International de Piano XXème Siècle Competitions.
        His recordings include music by Beethoven, Liszt, Stockhausen, Ravel, Stravinsky, Charles Ives, Elliott Carter, Frederic Rzewski, John Cage, Colin McPhee, and John Zorn.

 

This is an in-person event with a private stream available to the NEC community here: https://necmusic.edu/live

  1. Carl Ruggles | Three Evocations (1937-40)

    Largo
    Andante, sempre poco rubato
    Adagio sostenuto

  2. Paul Beaudoin | the complex responsibility of a simple line (2022)

    from Soundscapes, vol. 1

    First Performance

    Program note

    the complex responsibility of a simple line is one of the Soundfield compositions. This set of compositions explores the alignment between my visual and sound worlds. Each Soundfield uses adifferent fixed electronic media “background” akin to the painter’s canvas.  The performer, like the painter, then “acts” on the canvas.   While the pitch material is fixed (the "colors"), the performercan place them in the musical space more or less as they wish, making each performance a unique listening experience.
    – Paul Beaudoin

  3. Marti Epstein | Haven (2006)

    Program note

    Haven was a commission from Boston pianist Paul Carlson who requested that the piece have something to do with the idea of utopia. Haven is meant to be a quiet, calm respite from the noise and confusion of daily life.  It begins with single notes  interspersed with silences.  Gradually those single notes turn into chords, and gradually the chords turn into rolled chords, which eventually dissipate back into silence.
    - Marti Epstein

  4. INTERMISSION

  5. Claude Debussy | Suite bergamesque (1905)

    Prélude
    Menuet
    Clair de lune
    Passepied

  6. Manuel de Falla | Fantasia Baetica (1919)