presents
Auditorium, APS Conference Center, Argonne National Laboratory
Saturday, November 10, 2007, at 8:00 p.m.
(Please note changes!)
 |
| Program | ||
|---|---|---|
| Franz Liszt (1811-1886) | – | Nuages gris On the death of Laszlo Telecki Recueillement Ave Maria |
| Charles-Valentin Alkan (1813-1888) | – | Vingt ans from Grande Sonate Op. 33 La chanson de folle au bord de la mer Le premier billet doux Allegro barbaro |
| Frederic Chopin (1810-1849) | – | Prelude in c-sharp minor Op. 45 Mazurka in c-sharp minor Op. 6 No. 2 Mazurka in c-sharp minor Op. 30 No. 4 Ballade No. 1 in g minor Op. 23 |
| Franz Schubert (1797-1828) | – | Sonata in B-flat major D. 960 |
More on the artist, post-concert reception, location, and ordering tickets below.
This program is partially supported by the University of Chicago and the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency.
Regarded as one of the finest American piano virtuosos of his generation, and first prize winner in New Orleans International Piano Competition and Joanna Hodges International Piano Competition, James Giles regularly performs in major musical centers in America, Europe, and Asia. The past few seasons have included a tour of China and a recital at Warsaw’s Chopin Academy of Music. Last season, in addition to performances in Italy and Bosnia, he collaborated with the Cassatt, Chicago and Pacifica Quartets, with tenor Anthony Dean Griffey, with violinist Gerardo Ribiero, and with the Chicago Chamber Musicians. During the 2005-06 season he appeared as soloist with the symphony orchestras of Bangor, Boise, Evanston, and Fresno. He performed Gershwin’s Concerto in F and Rhapsody in Blue with the Fresno Philharmonic on five days notice, replacing the indisposed soloist. This season, in addition to recitals in Chicago, Oklahoma, and Buffalo, he appears with the St. Petersburg Chamber Philharmonic in Russia.
In an eclectic repertoire encompassing the solo and chamber music literatures, Giles is equally at home in the standard repertoire as in the music of our time. He has commissioned and premiered works by William Bolcom, C. Curtis-Smith, Stephen Hough, Lowell Liebermann, Ned Rorem, Augusta Read Thomas, Earl Wild, and James Wintle. Most of these new works are featured on Giles’s new Albany Records release entitled “American Virtuoso.”
His Paris recital at the Salle Cortot in 2004 was hailed as “a true revelation, due equally to the pianist’s artistry as to his choice of program.” After a recital at the Sibelius Academy, the critic for Helsinki’s main newspaper wrote that “Giles is a technically polished, elegant pianist.” And a London critic called his 2003 Wigmore Hall recital “one of the most sheerly inspired piano recitals I can remember hearing for some time” and added that “with a riveting intelligence given to everything he played, it was the kind of recital you never really forget.”
In the fall of 2005, and in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Dr. Giles joined three other pianists as a part of a “Pianists for New Orleans” tour. They raised over $70,000 for the Musical Arts Society of New Orleans, a non-profit group that supports classical music in the city.
He has performed with New York’s Jupiter Symphony; the London Soloists Chamber Orchestra in Queen Elizabeth Hall; the Kharkiv Philharmonic in Ukraine; and with the Opera Orchestra of New York in Alice Tully Hall. After his Tully Hall solo recital debut, critic Harris Goldsmith wrote: “Giles has a truly distinctive interpretive persona. This was beautiful pianism – direct and unmannered.” Other tours have included concerts in Chicago’s Dame Myra Hess Series, Salt Lake City’s Assembly Hall Concert Series, and in Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, the Musikhalle in Hamburg, and the Purcell Room at London’s South Bank Centre. He has given live recitals over the public radio stations of New York, Boston, Chicago, and Indianapolis. His compact disc of works by Schumann and Prokofiev is available on England’s Master Musicians label. As a chamber musician he has collaborated with members of the National and Chicago Symphonies and with members of the Pacifica, Cassatt, Chicago, Ying, Chester, St. Lawrence, Essex, Lincoln, and Miami Quartets, as well as singers Aprile Millo and Anthony Dean Griffey.
A native of North Carolina, Dr. Giles studied with Byron Janis at the Manhattan School of Music, Jerome Lowenthal at the Juilliard School, Nelita True at the Eastman School of Music, and Robert Shannon at Oberlin College.
The pianist received early career assistance from the Clarisse B. Kampel Foundation and was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to study in Florence with the legendary pianist Lazar Berman. He was the recipient of a fellowship grant and the $25,000 Christel Award from the American Pianists Association and now serves on the APA’s National Advisory Board. He won first prizes at the New Orleans International Piano Competition, the Joanna Hodges International Piano Competition, and the Music Teachers National Association Competition. As a student he was awarded the prestigious William Petschek Scholarship at the Juilliard School and the Rudolf Serkin Award for outstanding graduate at the Oberlin College Conservatory. He has written for Piano and Keyboard magazine and has presented lecture-recitals at the national conventions of the Music Teachers National Association, the College Music Society, and Pi Kappa Lambda. He has served on the juries of several international piano competitions, including the Cleveland International Piano Competition (screening jury), New Orleans International Piano Competition, and the Oberlin International Piano Competition.
Dr. Giles is on the piano faculty at Northwestern University. He frequently gives master classes at colleges and universities nationwide. He has been a guest professor at the Sibelius Academy in Finland and at Indiana University, where he has twice taught the students of Menahem Pressler. He has formerly served on the faculties of the University of North Texas and the Interlochen Arts Academy. He is the founder of the Las Vegas Piano Institute, an educational summer program for young pianists, and is the chair of the piano department at the Eastern Music Festival during the summers.
The audience is invited to join the artist at a reception following the performance.
The concert will be presented in the Auditorium of the APS Conference Center (Bldg. 402) at Argonne.
The concert is open to the public.
Photo ID is required to enter the laboratory site.
Visitors need to register prior to the event
by calling 630-252-3751 during regular working hours.
Don't know how to reach Argonne? Confused about the layout of the laboratory site? Here are some navigational aids:
Admission to the concert is $25.
Call 630-252-3751 to order your tickets now,
VISA and MasterCard accepted;
or use the
ticket request form
to order your tickets by mail.
Remaining tickets will be sold in the lobby of the Argonne Cafeteria (Bldg. 213) between noon and 1:00 p.m. during the week immediately preceding the concert.
The Auditorium Box Office will open one-half hour before the performance.