CWU's Pickett Featured In Piano/Voice Recital In Seattle

ELLENSBURG, Wash. - Dr. John Pickett, Central Washington University music professor, will take center stage for a concert in the 540-seat Illsley Ball Nordstrom Recital Hall at Benaroya Hall in Seattle on Sunday, Jan. 29, at 7 p.m.

Tickets are $15 for adults and $10 for students and seniors, with proceeds earmarked for the CWU Piano Scholarship/Sonatina fund. They are available through Ticketmaster and the CWU music department office. The concert is made possible in part by a 2005 SEED grant through the CWU graduate studies program.

Among the featured voice and piano compositions will be Pickett's "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird," based on the poem by Wallace Stevens. It was a finalist in the 2003 National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) art song competition.

Along with Pickett's compositions, the concert will include Liszt's Sonata for Piano in B Minor. Pickett will be accompany Robert McPherson, tenor, and CWU professors Diane Reich, soprano, and Vijay Singh, bass-baritone.

A renowned pianist, Pickett was a finalist in the Orleans Competition of Music of the 20th Century in Orleans, France, in 1994. He was invited back the following year to perform solo recitals in both Paris and Orleans. Pickett has also performed solo and chamber recitals and with orchestra in the U.S., Estonia, France, Hungary, Poland and Scotland.

Along with his work at CWU, Pickett has taught master-classes throughout the U.S., Europe, Canada and Mexico. He is the director of the CWU Sonatina Festival that annually attracts more than 400 pianists to Central. His students have been winners of the Washington State Music Teachers Association state solo competition and have gone on to pursue graduate degrees at prestigious institutions as teaching assistants.

Pickett received his bachelor's and master's degrees in piano at The Juilliard School of Music, and his doctorate in piano performance, with a minor in music history and arts administration from Indiana University.

Contact: John Pickett (509-963-1246/fax 509-963-1239/e-mail: pickettj@cwu.edu)

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