Piano Faculty

JAMES GILES (Department Chair) Northwestern University faculty member. First prizes in New Orleans International Piano Competition, Joanna Hodges Int’l Piano Competition, and the MTNA Collegiate Competition. American Pianists Association Fellowship; Fulbright Scholar in Italy. Soloist with Jupiter Symphony, London Soloists Chamber Orchestra, Kharkiv Philharmonic, Opera Orchestra of New York, Boise Philharmonic, Fresno Philharmonic. Concerts in Alice Tully Hall (Lincoln Center), Carnegie Hall, Kennedy Center, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Philharmonic Hall (St. Petersburg), and tour of China. Recent acclaimed debuts in Wigmore Hall (London), Salle Cortot (Paris), Chopin Academy (Warsaw), Sibelius Academy (Helsinki). Chamber music with members of Chicago and National Symphonies. Premiered works by William Bolcom, Stephen Hough, Lowell Liebermann, Ned Rorem, Augusta Read Thomas, and Earl Wild. Founder, Las Vegas Piano Institute. Piano division chair, Eastern Music Festival. Former faculty, University of North Texas, Interlochen Arts Academy. Recent guest professor at Indiana University and Sibelius Academy (Helsinki). Studied with Byron Janis and Lazar Berman; Jerome Lowenthal (Juilliard), Nelita True (Eastman), and Robert Shannon (Oberlin). www.jamesgiles.net

Praised by audiences and critics alike for his fresh interpretations and dramatic presentation style, pianist YOSHIKAZU NAGAI has performed as soloist and chamber musician across North America and abroad in such venues as the National Recital Hall in Taiwan, Carnegie Recital Hall and Merkin Concert Hall in New York, Kennedy Center's Terrace Theatre, Eckhardt-Gramatté Hall in Canada, Castello de Donna Fugato in Italy, and Seattle's Benaroya Hall. His extensive recital schedules in recent seasons have included performances in Taipei, Hong Kong, Italy, San Francisco, San Antonio, New York, Seattle, New Orleans, and Washington D.C. among others.  Mr. Nagai has also appeared at the Aspen Music Festival, the Sarasota Music Festival, Music Academy of the West, Spoleto Music Festival, Eastern Music Festival, the Philips Collection, and the International Piano Series in Charleston, South Carolina.  In addition, he is a frequent soloist with orchestras throughout the USA and his performances have been broadcast on National Public Radio's "Performance Today", RAI (Italian National TV),  Hong Kong National Radio, KUHF-Houston, KBYU-Salt Lake City, WCLV-Cleveland, and worldwide over the internet.  Mr. Nagai won first prize at the 2002 Washington International Piano Competition and the Liszt Special Mention Prize in the 2002 IBLA Grand Prize International Piano Competition held in Italy. He has also won major prizes at the San Antonio International Piano Competition, Missouri Southern International Piano Competition, New Orleans International Piano Competition and the Concert Artists Guild International Music Competition (inaugural SVCCS performance prize).  Mr. Nagai is currently Professor of Piano at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music where he teaches piano and chamber music.  Prior to his recent appointment at SFCM, he was a piano faculty member at the Interlochen Arts Academy in Michigan for eight years where he taught piano, chamber music, and piano literature.  Recognized by the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts (NFAA) for excellence in teaching, he frequently gives master classes and serves as juror throughout the United States and Asia. Current and former students of Mr. Nagai are top prizewinners of national and international competitions including the 2007 Lev Vlassenko Piano Competition, Kosciuszko Foundation Chopin Piano Competition, Music Teacher's National Association Piano Competition, Missouri Southern International Piano Competition, Vladimir Viardo International Piano Competition, Lennox International Young Artists Piano Competition, and Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition.  Mr. Nagai studied with John Perry at Rice University and received his master of music degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music where he was awarded the Malvina Podis Prize in Piano upon graduation.  Other teachers include Paul Schenly, Sergei Babayan, and Duane Hulbert. www.yoshinagai.com

GIDEON RUBIN Soloist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Boston Classical Orchestra, Mannes Orchestra, New World Symphony, and many solo and chamber music recitals throughout the US and Europe. Performance of John Adams’s “Grand Pianola Music” at San Francisco’s Davies Hall featured on “Jim Lehrer News Hour.”  Performed on live radio broadcasts in Chicago, Los Angeles, Boston, and Israel.  Performed as a member of the Garth Newel Piano quartet in residence in Virginia and on tour in Sicily.  Served as pianist/keyboardist for the New World Symphony under the direction of Michael Tilson Thomas, performing in Alice Tully Hall and major venues of Europe.  B.A. degree from Harvard cum laude, M.M. from Boston University, and Doctorate from the University of Southern California. Studied with Edward Aldwell, Russell Sherman, Benjamin Pasternack, and Norman Krieger. Served on faculty of Pomona College, and currently Music Director and Piano Faculty member of the Los Angeles Music and Art School and the founder/conductor of the LAMAS Youth Orchestra.  His original compositions have been performed in Los Angeles, Virginia, North Carolina, and Boston. www.gideon-rubin.com

 

2008 Piano Artists in Residence

Pianist CHRISTINA DAHL has had a multi-faceted career as a chamber player, soloist and teacher. She has been on the piano faculty at SUNY Stony Brook for nine years, and was previously at Lawrence University. She has been a collaborating artist at the Aspen Music Festival and the Ravinia Festival, and held fellowships at Tanglewood and the Banff Centre. Ms. Dahl has performed at Carnegie Weill Hall, Merkin Hall, and the National Gallery in Washington DC. She has bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Peabody Conservatory where she was a student of Ann Schein, and has done doctoral work at SUNY Stony Brook with Gilbert Kalish.

 

In 1992, AWADAGIN PRATT won the Naumburg International Piano Competition and two years later was awarded a 1994 Avery Fisher Career Grant. He has played numerous recitals throughout the U.S. including performances in New York at Lincoln Center, Washington, D.C. at the Kennedy Center, Los Angeles at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and Chicago at Orchestra Hall. His many orchestral performances include appearances with the New York Philharmonic, Orchestra of St. Luke's, Minnesota Orchestra and the Pittsburgh, St. Louis, National, Detroit and New Jersey symphonies. He is currently an Associate Professor of Piano and Artist in Residence at the College Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati.

 

Winner of the prestigious Avery Fisher Prize, pianist PAUL SCHENLY has been soloist with major United States orchestras, including the Atlanta Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, Chicago Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, and New York Philharmonic. He appeared in the Great Performers Series at Lincoln Center, and in acclaimed recitals at Carnegie Hall. Mr. Schenly has appeared with many of the world’s leading conductors including James Levine, Eric Leinsdorf, Christoph Von Dohnanyi, Edo de Waart, Mstislav Rostropovich, Christoph Eschenbach, Loren Maazel, Michael Tilson Thomas, Zubin Mehta, Robert Shaw, and Aaron Copland. He is currently the head of the Piano Department at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

Since NELITA TRUE made her debut at age seventeen with the Chicago Symphony in Orchestra Hall and her New York debut with the Juilliard Orchestra in Avery Fisher Hall, her career has taken her to the major cities of Western and Eastern Europe, Indonesia, Korea, Japan, Mexico, Iceland, New Zealand, Brazil, Australia, Canada, and to Hong Kong and Singapore, as well as to forty-nine states in America. She was a visiting professor at the St. Petersburg Conservatory in Russia, performing and conducting master classes and has been in the People's Republic of China twelve times for recitals and master classes. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Michigan with Helen Titus, Ms. True went on to Juilliard to study with Sascha Gorodnitzki, and then earned the DMA with Leon Fleisher at the Peabody Conservatory. In Paris, she studied with Nadia Boulanger on a Fulbright grant. Formerly Distinguished Professor at the University of Maryland, Ms. True is currently Professor of Piano at the Eastman School of Music. Ms. True was awarded the Certificate of Merit by the Alumni Association of the University of Michigan, the Eisenhart Award for Excellence in Teaching at Eastman, the 2002 Achievement Award from MTNA, and a Lifetime Achievement Award from National Keyboard Pedagogy Conference (USA).