Contact:

Sarah Ray

802-443-5794

sray@middlebury.edu

Posted: November 5, 2001

MIDDLEBURY,

VT - Distinguished

pianist Ivan Moravec, acclaimed as one of the great

recitalists of our time, will visit Middlebury College for

an afternoon concert on Sunday, Nov. 18, at 3 p.m. in the

Concert Hall at the Center for the Arts on South Main Street

(Route 30).

The Czech

master’s program for the concert will be Chopin’s

“Eight Mazurkas and Fantaisie in F Minor, Opus 49;”

Janácek’s “Sonata der Strasse: I-X;”

and Debussy’s “La Soirée dans

Grenade.”

A native of

Prague who is now in his early 70s, Moravec has played

American venues since 1964. He has performed with most of

America’s major orchestras and symphonies in New York,

Boston, Atlanta, Dallas, Los Angeles, Toronto and

Philadelphia, to name a few. He has been welcomed in the

music capitals of the world, including London, Vienna,

Paris, Berlin, Tokyo, Munich, Rome, Sydney and

Amsterdam.

Audiences

have also enjoyed Moravec’s talent in solo and festival

performances around the world. He has produced a library of

recordings on a host of labels, including Vox, Moss Music

and Connoisseur Society. The most critically acclaimed have

been his interpretations of Chopin, Debussy, Beethoven,

Brahms and Mozart.

Despite his

long resume and accomplishments, Moravec has often toiled in

relative obscurity, away from the glare of marketing and

stardom. So suggested a reviewer from Music Web UK, who last

year wrote about Moravec following a recital at

London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall: “He belongs to a dying

breed of pianists, who devote their entire life to their

instrument as well as to teaching. His self-criticism is

well known and it can take years until he presents his

interpretation of a specific work to an audience. The result

is ultimate perfection.”

Critics of

Moravec’s work don’t hesitate to label him a

virtuoso. Piano Magazine lauded a Moravec recording of

Chopin, Debussy, Franck and Ravel in 1999 saying that “what

makes his playing most memorable … is his searching

musicianship, complemented by an eloquent sophistication of

phrase which makes many of his more famous colleagues

primitive by comparison.”

The critics

say Moravec’s technique and its results set him apart

as a great interpreter of the masters such as Chopin and

Debussy. “The sound he produces on a piano, for instance, is

deep, free, consistently beautiful,” wrote the Toronto Globe

& Mail last year. “There’s no one else like

him.”

Moravec’s

concert is sponsored by the Middlebury College Performing

Arts Series. Tickets are $10 for general admission and $8

for seniors. A pre-performance brunch begins at 1:30 p.m. at

Rehearsals Cafe in the Center for the Arts. For tickets or

brunch reservations, call the College Box Office at

802-443-6433.