The Department of Music will sponsor Keyboard Kapers, featuring a piano masterclass and recital with visiting artist Futaba Niekawa Thursday and Friday, March 10-11.
The piano masterclass will be presented on Thursday, March 10, at 4 p.m., featuring students of Linfield music professor Albert Kim. The Friday, March 11, recital will be at 7:30 p.m. and include performances by students and works by Beethoven, Chopin and Liszt performed by Niekawa. The recital will also feature selections from Olivier Messiaen’s piano-duo masterpiece Visions de l’Amen, performed by Niekawa and Kim. Both events will be in the Delkin Recital Hall, Vivian A. Bull Music Center.
Niekawa is a postdoctoral scholar and visiting assistant professor of strings/collaborative piano at Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. Known for her verve and sensitivity, she is versatile as a soloist, collaborator, improviser and harpsichordist. She has given performances in renowned venues and festivals both in the U. S. and abroad. Her numerous collaborative engagements led to working relationships with such musicians as Jean Barr, Charles Castleman, James Buswell, Roger Tapping, Carol Rodland, Steven Doane, Paul Katz, Laurence Lesser, and the Lafayette and Borromeo quartets. She regularly performs with her duo partners across several continents. She is a founding member of duo526, a violin-piano duo that released its debut album, Ballade, through PARMA recordings in 2014. Her discography also includes the world premiere recording of “Twenty-Five Preludes” by pianist/composer Hwaen Ch’uqi. Niekawa earned her doctorate degree from the Eastman School of Music.
Kim, assistant professor of music at Linfield since 2013, made his professional debut at age 10. He earned his doctorate from the Eastman School of Music, where he studied piano with Natalya Antonova and completed an assistantship in music theory under Matthew Brown. Kim has performed throughout the United States and Europe as a soloist and chamber musician, with performances at Weill Hall, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Konzerthaus Wien, the Köln Philharmonie, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and more. Kim has collaborated in chamber and ensemble performances with Ensemble Signal, Eastman Musica Nova, Charles Castleman, Colin Jacobsen, Edward Arron, the Argos Piano Trio, the Tabletop Opera and fellow Linfield professor, Anton Belov. He has coached chamber music at Linfield College and UNC Chapel Hill and serves as a music mentor for Linfield’s thriving ensemble education program.
Both events are free and open to the public. For more information, call 503-883-2275 or visit linfield.edu/arts.
