Earlier this year, representatives of the Performing Arts Center and the Hugh Hodgson School of Music traveled to Hamburg, Germany, to select a new Steinway grand piano. It will be inaugurated Oct. 12 at 7:30 p.m. in a free (tickets required) Hodgson Concert Hall recital by young English virtuoso Isata Kanneh-Mason.
Preceding the concert from 6:30-7:15 p.m. is a lecture by Fred Child, host of “Performance Today,” the most popular classical music radio program in the U.S., heard locally weekday mornings on WUGA. His appearance is part of the UGA Signature Lecture series.
Kanneh-Mason, from a large family of musicians, is in demand internationally as a soloist and chamber musician. She offers a repertoire with recital programs encompassing music from Haydn and Mozart via Fanny Mendelssohn and Clara Schumann, Chopin and Brahms to Gershwin and beyond. In concertos, she is equally at home in Felix Mendelssohn and Schumann (whose piano concerto featured on Isata’s chart-topping debut recording) as in Prokofiev and Dohnányi.
Highlights of her 2023-2024 season include performances with the Philadelphia Orchestra, National Arts Centre Orchestra Ottawa, London Mozart Players, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra on tour in the U.S. and Germany, Royal Northern Sinfonia, Cleveland Orchestra, Toronto Symphony and Stockholm Philharmonic. With her brother and cellist Sheku, she appears in recital in Japan, Singapore and South Korea in addition to an extensive European recital tour. Kanneh-Mason also gives a series of solo recitals on tour in the USA and Canada as well as at London’s Wigmore Hall, the Lucerne Festival and across Germany.
Since 2000, Child has been the host of APM’s “Performance Today.” He is also the commentator and announcer for “Live From Lincoln Center,” the only live performing arts series on U.S. television. He hosts musical events on stages around the country, working with major orchestras and festivals, and connecting with audiences coast to coast.
Kanneh-Mason’s recital is but one event in the UGA Presents Year of the Piano. Jazz pianist Brad Mehldau performs a solo recital Feb. 4, Marc-André Hamelin appears with the Takács Quartet March 24, and classical superstar Lang Lang plays a solo recital April 27.
As UGA Presents’ first Artist in Focus, Kanneh-Mason will return Jan. 29 with London’s Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, which she has served as artist in residence.
This performance is supported by Gloria Coile Wells, Murray and Dorris Tillman, and Janice Simon.
Three ways to get tickets
- Purchase tickets online at pac.uga.edu.
- Call the Performing Arts Center box office at 706-542-4400, Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
- Visit the UGA Performing Arts Center box office, Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. (five-minute parking is available in the drop off circle at the Performing Arts Center for purchasing or picking up tickets.)
Single tickets begin at $25, and UGA student tickets are just $10. Parking is free.
To learn more about all UGA Performing Arts Center events, visit pac.uga.edu.