Pianist James Prell will join the Washington University Symphony Orchestra for a performance at 3 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 22, in the University’s Graham Chapel.
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WHO: Washington University Symphony Orchestra, with soloist James Prell WHAT: Concert PROGRAM: Music of Johannes Brahms, Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel WHEN: 3 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 22 WHERE: Graham Chapel, just north of the Mallinckrodt Student Center, 6445 Forsyth Blvd. COST: free and open to the public INFORMATION: (314) 935-4841 |
Prell, a junior in Arts & Sciences, will be the featured soloist in Maurice Ravel’s virtuosic work for piano and orchestra, Concerto in G Major. The piece is rife with jazz elements and reflects the French composer’s love of that distinctly American idiom. Indeed, Ravel began composing the concerto in 1929, shortly after having heard George Gershwin perform his own jazz-laden, rhythmically intricate Rhapsody in Blue.
Prell, who is pursuing a minor in music, is a student of Seth Carlin, director of the piano program. Carlin noted that, “The Department of Music is proud to nurture and support extremely talented students like Jim, whose academic interests, outside of the piano, range from chemistry and German to his study of music composition and the completion of several of his own works.” Prell’s home is in Champaign, IL.
Dan Presgrave, instrumental music coordinator in the Department of Music, conducts the 70-plus-member orchestra. The program also includes Johannes Brahms’ popular Academic Festival Overture and the Petite Suite of Claude Debussy.
Admission is free and open to the public. Graham Chapel is located just north of the Mallinckrodt Student Center, 6445 Forsyth Blvd. For more information, call (314) 935-4841.