Fei Fei Dong – Finalist Van Cliburn Competition 2013 (photo Ellen Appel-Mike Moreland/The Cliburn)
(POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y.) – Van Cliburn Competition finalist Fei-Fei Dong will assay the most technically demanding and monumental piano concerto of all time, the powerful Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 3, as featured soloist with the Hudson Valley Philharmonic at the Bardavon on Saturday, May 3, 2014, at 8pm. The evening will also include a performance of Pulitzer Prize-winner Jennifer Higdon’s Concerto for Orchestra. Maestro Randall Craig Fleischer will conduct the program and host a pre-concert talk with members of the orchestra one hour before curtain. All ticketholders are invited.
Praised for her “natural musicality and beauty of tone” during the 14th Cliburn Competition, Chinese pianist Fei-Fei Dong landed among the top six finalists and won three years of concert tours in the United States. She has begun to build a reputation for her poetic interpretations, charming audiences with her “passion, piquancy and tenderness” and “winning stage presence.”
Ms. Dong gave her first recital at age 10 and made her orchestra debut three years later, performing Rachmaninoff’s Concerto No. 3 with the Macau Youth Symphony Orchestra. She has since appeared with the Aspen Music Festival and the Hong Kong, Juilliard, Shanxi, and Shenzhen Symphony Orchestras. She has made debuts in Alice Tully Hall, Warsaw Philharmonic Concert Hall, and the Louvre Auditorium, and been featured multiple times on New York’s WQXR radio. Her inaugural season as a Cliburn winner includes debuts with the Corpus Christi and Big Spring Symphony Orchestras with John Giordano, and recital appearances across the United States.
Fei-Fei Dong, age 22 of China, performs a 60-minute solo recital during the semi-final rounds of 14th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition at Bass Hall in Fort Worth, Texas, USA on Tuesday, June 4, 2013. (Photo Ralph Lauer/ The Cliburn)
Born in Shenzhen, Ms. Dong began piano lessons at the age of 5. She moved to New York to study at the Juilliard School, earning her Bachelor of Music under the guidance of Yoheved Kaplinsky, with whom she continues to study in pursuit of her master’s degree.
Pulitzer-prize winner Jennifer Higdon (b. Brooklyn, NY, December 31, 1962) is one of the most performed living American composers working today. Her commissions range from the Cleveland Orchestra and the Philadelphia Orchestra to eighth blackbird and the Tokyo String Quartet; and from “The President’s Own” Marine Band to such artists as Hilary Hahn. Higdon received the 2010 Pulitzer Prize in Music for her Violin Concerto, with the committee citing her work as a “deeply engaging piece that combines flowing lyricism with dazzling virtuosity.” She has also received awards from the Serge Koussevitzky Foundation, the Guggenheim Foundation, the American Academy of Arts & Letters (two awards), the Pew Fellowship in the Arts, Meet-the-Composer, National Endowment for the Arts, and ASCAP. In January 2010, Higdon received a Grammy for Best Contemporary Classical Composition for her Percussion Concerto. She holds the Rock Chair in Composition at The Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.
Maestro Fleischer is the dynamic, engaging music director of the Hudson Valley Philharmonic, who celebrates 21 seasons with the HVP this year. He is a leading force in the classical music scene throughout the United States. His charismatic personality and contagious love of music ignite orchestral brilliance in every concert he conducts.
This year, the HVP celebrates its 54th season. It was 79 years ago that four local amateur musicians founded the Dutchess Philharmonic Community Orchestra, and 54 years since conductor Claude Monteux elevated the orchestra to a fully professional ensemble, renaming it the Hudson Valley Philharmonic. This also represents the orchestra’s 15th year under Bardavon management.
Tickets for RACH 3 range in price from $32 to $55. Student Rush tickets will be available one hour prior to the concert for $20. Tickets are going fast and can be purchased at:
Bardavon Box Office UPAC Box Office
35 Market Street 601 Broadway
Poughkeepsie Kingston
845.473.2072 845.339.6088
or through TicketMaster 800.745.3000 or www.ticketmaster.com.
The Bardavon 1869 Opera House, Inc. (the Bardavon) is a New York State nonprofit corporation that owns and operates two historic theaters – the 944-seat namesake theater in Poughkeepsie and 1510-seat Ulster Performing Arts Center (UPAC) in Kingston – and the region’s premiere orchestra, the Hudson Valley Philharmonic. It presents top-notch music, dance, theater, and classic films for diverse audiences in both its venues; stages free annual outdoor events in local communities; and partners with regional schools to offer unique arts-based learning experiences. The Bardavon also continues to restore and preserve its historic theaters for today’s audiences and future generations to enjoy.