Ganz, Babcock to Perform in Free Concert April 2
St. Mary’s College of Maryland musician-in-residence Brian Ganz will be joined by Beverly Babcock in a performance of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 in G major at 11:10am April 2. Mr. Ganz will play the solo piano part and Ms. Babcock will accompany him on a second piano in a reduction of the orchestra part.
The concert, which will take place in the new Dodge Performing Arts Center on campus, is free and open to the public.
For more information, call 240-895-4498 or visit SMCM website.
“There are few genres where one can identify a specific masterwork as The Greatest,” Mr. Ganz said. “But I would say that this is one case where it’s fully justified: I believe Beethoven’s 4th Piano Concerto is the greatest ever composed. It has everything: gorgeous melodic ideas, superb craftsmanship, dramatic storytelling- especially in the second movement, scintillating writing for the piano, innovation- as it is the first piano concerto to begin with the piano all by itself, and much more. I’ll speak about the concerto and together Beverly and I will demonstrate some ideas at the piano. Then we’ll play it in its entirety.”
Mr. Ganz has appeared as soloist with such orchestras as the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, the National Philharmonic, the Baltimore and the National Symphonies, the City of London Sinfonia, and L’Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte Carlo.
Ms. Babcock has spent her life in the world of music, beginning her piano studies at the age of 5 with Bristow Hardin in Norfolk, VA. Later she received a degree in piano performance from Peabody Conservatory, where she studied with Ellen Mack and Leon Fleisher. Her post-graduate studies were with John Owings, pianist in residence at Indiana University of South Bend.
