UMaine Students Set for Master Classes with Award-Winning Pianist
Contact: David Whitehill, (207) 992-3511 or david@bangorsymphony.org
Four University of Maine music students will have the opportunity to participate in a master class with award-winning pianist Martina Filjak from 10 a.m. to noon Friday, January 14, in UMaine’s Minsky Recital Hall.
Each student will have an opportunity to play for Filjak, the winner of the 2009 Cleveland International Piano Competition, who will work with each student for about 30 minutes. Filjak is the featured soloist for a Bangor Symphony Orchestra concert at 4 p.m. Sunday, January 16, at the Collins Center for the Arts.
Filjak and the students, who study under UMaine Associate Professor Baycka Voronietsky, will be available for interviews starting at 9:45 a.m. at Minsky Recital Hall. The media is invited to stay for the master classes, which are free and open to the public.
The master classes, which are in their second year, are made possible through the BSO’s Dr. Maurice P. King Endowment Fund, which was set up in 2009 by Belfast resident Constance King Barnes, a 1943 UMaine graduate.
Filjak, who is from Croatia, will play composer Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2 on Sunday with the BSO.
Filjak has performed with many orchestras, including the Cleveland Orchestra; the Zagreb, Strasbourg, Morocco, Belgrade and Torino Philharmonics; the Bilbao, Zagreb, Croatian, Moscow, Tenerife, Vallès and Barcelona Symphony Orchestras; the Croatian Chamber Orchestra and the Chamber Orchestra of South Africa.
The New York Times declared Filjak a “pianist to watch” after her Carnegie Hall debut in December 2009. In October 2009 she was awarded an Honorary Medal by the President of the Republic of Croatia for her artistic achievements.
In addition to her victory at the Cleveland International Piano Competition, Filjak has won numerous competitions and prizes, including first place at the 2007 International Viotti Piano Competition, the 2008 Maria Canals International Piano Competition in Barcelona and the 2001 International Johannes Brahms Competition. She was awarded Fifth Prize at the 2007 Busoni Competition in Bolzano, Italy and was a Prizewinner at the 2008 Unisa International Piano Competition in Pretoria, South Africa.
For more information contact Bangor Symphony Orchestra Executive Director David Whitehill.