The Performing Arts Center presents award-winning clarinetist Jose Franch-Ballester Feb. 2 at 8 p.m. in Ramsey Concert Hall. Tickets are $9 for UGA students and $18 for everyone else. A discount is available for groups.
A native of Moncofa, Spain, Franch-Ballester won first prize in the 2004 Young Concert Artists International Auditions. His Athens program will include works by César Franck, Sergei Prokofiev and Francis Poulenc, along with a piece written for him by American composer Kenji Bunch. Franch-Ballester was born into a family of clarinetists and Zarzuela singers. He began clarinet lessons at age 9 and gave his first recital at the age of 16. He graduated from the Joaquin Rodrigo Conservatory in Valencia in 2000 and came to the U.S. to study at Philadelphia’s Curtis Institute of Music where he earned a bachelor’s degree in music.
He will be accompanied by pianist Andrius Zlabys, whom the Cleveland Plain Dealer recently called “a virtuoso of fabulous technique and romantic temperament.”