On Saturday 22 June, 8pm at St James Cavalier Centre for Creativity, Valletta, pianist Tricia Dawn Williams will present a program of 20th century and contemporary works by composers from Hungary, America, France and Malta.
Williams specialises in the performance of 20th century and contemporary music. Since 1999 she has been under the guidance of Pawlu Grech. Her repertoire ranges from Béla Bartók to today’s modern composers. Over the years she has organised and taken part in several recitals and interdisciplinary projects collaborating with Maltese composers and other contemporary composers worldwide commissioning and premiering their works both in her own country and abroad.
The program opens with Ideograms Book 1 by Pawlu Grech. This work is a research into sound as the basis for musical composition. Starting from the single sound and varying its intensity, timbre and duration, the possibilities afforded by the irreducible nature of sound are progressively unfolded and developed.
Four Dirges by Béla Bartók are four short piano pieces that owe their existence to Bartók's discovery of Romanian mourning songs in 1909. Since 1905, Bartók had been collecting folk songs from Eastern Europe, and their exotic scales had soon made their way into the composer's work.
From Hungary the music shifts to America, a very recent composition written for Williams. Salt of the Earth, the Sea and of Meby Scott McAllister was inspired by one of the composer’s grandmother’s poems by the same name. The poem was written after the death of her son at the age of 44.
Fantasy II from Four Piano Pieces by Béla Bartók is an early work. In some of his early compositions, Bartók divulged the influence of a composer he long admired, Franz Liszt. These four early piano pieces are such compositions. The third of the four pieces is Fantasie II which, showing hints of Liszt, divulges Rachmaninov and Scriabin influences, as well.
Suite Caféinée by Pierre-Adrien Charpy will bring the exciting program to an end. The ‘suite caféinée’ provokes tough effects on the pianist who is playing it, just like coffee does!
The recital is supported by the Malta Arts Fund. Entrance is free of charge and tickets need not be booked in advance.
For further updates visit www.facebook.com/TriciaDawnWilliamsPianist
June 9, 2013