 The career of pianist Jeffrey Biegel has been marked by bold, creative achievements and highlighted by a series of firsts.
He performed the first live internet recitals in New York and Amsterdam in 1997 and 1998, enabling him to be seen and heard by a global audience. In 1999, he assembled the largest consortium of orchestras (over 25), to celebrate the millennium with a new concerto composed for him by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich. The piece, entitled 'Millennium Fantasy for Piano and Orchestra', was premiered with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. In 1997, he performed the World Premiere of the restored, original 1924 manuscript of George Gershwin's 'Rhapsody in Blue' with the Boston Pops. Charles Strouse composed a new work titled 'Concerto America' for Biegel, celebrating America and honoring the heroes and events of 9-11. Biegel premiered the piece with the Boston Pops in 2002. He transcribed the first edition of Balakirev's 'Islamey Fantasy' for piano and orchestra, which he premiered with the American Symphony Orchestra in 2001, and edited and recorded the first complete set of all '25 Preludes' by Cesar Cui.
Currently, he is assembling the first global consortium for the new 'Concerto no. 3 for Piano and Orchestra' being composed for him by Lowell Liebermann for 2005-06-07. The World Premiere will take place with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Andreas Delfs on May 12-14 2006, followed by the European Premiere with the Schleswig Holstein Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Gerard Oskamp, February 6-9, 2007.
Biegel is currently on the piano faculty at the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music at Brooklyn College, at the City University of New York (CUNY) and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY).
|
|
|
|
|
|
Monday, November 21, 2005
Ghost from the Past
It was only recently that I probed into the geneology of my pianistic roots. My paternal grandmother's cousin who is now 95 studied with James Friskin at Juilliard and then received her graduate degrees from Columbia University. Dr. Sonia Slatin (Slatin-Lewis when she married in her 60s!) taught Schenkerian analysis at Brooklyn College (where I now teach--small world!) and I was told recently that there was a well-known pianist who was my father's grandmother's cousin named Herman Kosoff. He was well known in Europe, came to the US, returned to Vienna to study with Leopold Godowsky, returned again to the US and settled in Mount Vernon, New York. Now comes the wild moment: after my recital for Doreen Marx's prestigious series in Miami (Sunday Afternoon of Music) yesterday, I was introduced to a man whose first words to me were, 'I studied with Herman Kosoff for four years in Mount Vernon in the 1930s. He prepared me for my auditions to Oberlin'. I didn't know what to do--I stood frozen, a tear came to my eye, stunned and somewhat touched by this man's presence--feeling the immortal presence of Herman Kosoff come to life. He shared with me how he remembered nightly chamber music concerts in Kosoff's home, for Kosoff at that point was playing only chamber music in his home and making a decent living teaching. I wish I had known him--but the fact that Jerome Benson, now 82 years young, came to me and shared this was amazing to me. Dr. Benson became a double major and carved a career in medicine, but his eyes lit up when he recollected about his years with my great-grandmother's cousin in the 1930s. It was a moment I'll remember for many years.
posted by Jeffrey Biegel
9:15 AM
|
| |
