The Holidays are approaching and the Italian Cultural Institute intends to celebrate the 2022 Festivities with the music of an instrument particularly linked to the Italian tradition: the piano.
Three hundred years ago it was an Italian, Bartolomeo Cristofori, who invented the first piano. Unlike the harpsichord, the piano was capable of expressively modulating the sound, through the “piano-forte” dynamics (which gave the instrument its name).
It was another Italian, Muzio Clementi who experimented with new pianistic sonorities, in a close dialogue between musical composition and instrument construction. Muzio Clementi gave birth to a piano school which basically never ended up to nowadays, given that his “studies” are fundamental to the technique of contemporary pianists. Muzio Clementi is considered the “father of the piano”; this year marks the 260th anniversary of his birth and the 190th anniversary of his death.
For these reasons, the Institute has organized a Piano Festival from December 6 to 8.
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Alessandro Vena
Piano Recital
December 7, at 6PM
Program
-GLUCK- KEMPFF: La Plainte d’Orphee
-M.CLEMENTI: Sonata op 47 N. 2
-BACH-SILOTI: Siciliano from Flute Sonata BWV1031
-M.CLEMENTI: Gradus ad Parnassum Etudes nn 30, 65
-W.A.MOZART: Sonata k 331
-L.W. BEETHOVEN: Paisiello Variations “Nel cor piu non mi sento”
-BACH-BUSONI: BWV 532
Alessandro Vena, pianist, harpsichordist and teacher, enjoys a wide repertoire that ranges from baroque to contemporary music, with romantic composers such as Chopin at its core. He studied at the Rubinstein Academy in Rome with Carlo Grante and Saha Bajcic (formerly of the Moscow Conservatoire), and soon after began an international performing career which has taken him all around his native Italy, and many countries around the world, throughout Europe, Russia, South America, Canada and to numerous cities in the USA. He has performed countless solo recitals, and concertos with orchestras that include the Russian State Philarmonic Orchestra and the Bulgarian State Philarmonic Orchestra. He played for the IIC in Los Angeles, The National Opera Center in New York, Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires, The Ohrid Choir Festival (Macedonian), Kino Babilon Berlin, Centennial of Assunsion (Paraguay), Center Culturel Belgium, Campbellsville University (USA), The Luisville Loretto Mhoterhouse (USA), Dimennacenter in New York, IIC in Buenos Aires, Teatro della Benevoletia in Buenos Aires, Middlesex University in London and many other venues.
His discography, with several critically-acclaimed CDs in the Sheva catalogue, includes works by Bach and Bach-Busoni, Scarlatti, Mozart, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt, Franck, Sibelius, Debussy, Schoenberg, Shostakovich, Rota, Pirrone, Paus, Lupis, Fribbins, Davide Zannoni, Philip Glass.
In 2010 Vena received the prestigious ‘Life of Music Award’ from the Sovereign Order of Malta and was awarded an Honour by the FAI (Italian Environment anf Heritage Fund). Italian Radio RAI-3 has broadcast many of Alessandro’s recordings and ‘Piano Solo’ magazine awarded his last CD the maximum 5 stars. In 2012 was presented on the cover of the popular ‘Music’ magazine together with the great Franco Zeffirelli. He is Principal Piano Professor at the Conservatory of State Music of Potenza (Italy).
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