DePauw to host National Harp Finals and free day of music

Monday, May 30, 2016
Russian prodigy Sasha Boldachev will be in Greencastle this week to present a solo harp concert at the Green Center's Thompson Recital Hall on Saturday, June 4 at 7:30 p.m. and join in offering free music instruction the following day at Music on the Square. (Courtesy photo)

Thanks to Alexandra Perdew, a member of DePauw University's Class of 2000 and a board member of the American Harp Society Foundation, the DePauw School of Music was selected to host the national finals of the Foundation's Anne Adams Awards and Grandjany Memorial Award competitions, June 3-4 on the DePauw campus.

For local music lovers that means some stellar international harpists will be offering free concerts at the Green Center this week -- along with a free day of music instruction on June 5 at Music on the Square.

On Friday, June 3 at 7:30 p.m., the brilliant Canadian harpist Caroline Lizotte will take the stage in Thompson Recital Hall. Internationally renowned as both a performer and as author of some of the most influential harp repertoire of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, she will present "Lizotte Plays Lizotte" at the conclusion of the intial day of competition at the Green Center.

Then on Saturday at 7:30 p.m., again in Thompson Recital Hall, the virtuoso Russian harpist Sasha Boldachev, winner of the British Brilliant Prodigies Award and the European Foundation for Culture's ProEuropa Award, will perform.

Included on Boldachev's program will be major works from classic Russian repertoire by Glinka, Mussorgsky, Rubinstein, Prokofiev and Tchaikovsky, which he will expand with some of his own arrangements for the culminating concert at the close of the Adams and Grandjany competitions.

If you've ever admired the heavenly sound of harp and wondered how to play one, a free day of music instruction will follow the national finals during Harp Day at M2 on June 5.

Nine harpists -- including co-director Perdew, her former teacher DePauw music professor Harriet Thompson Moore, Sasha Boldachev, Robbin Gordon-Cartier, Alice Keene, Carrie Kourkoumelis, Eileen Mason, Patty Adams Harris and Roland H. Ferrer -- will offer instruction in a wide range of harp styles at Music on the Square.

The program, "Harp: The Universal Instrument," which begins at 10 a.m. and concludes 3:30 p.m. and is co-spondored by the American Harp Society Inc. the American Harp Society Foundation, DePauw University, Lyon & Healy Harps, SalviHarps, and the Vanderbilt Music Company.

Throughout the day participants will learn techiniques from several traditions, including a tango, a gospel tune and a classical cannon.

No experience is necessary to participate in HarpDay at M2. All ages and skill levels welcome and instruments will be provided. For the full program of instruction, visit music.depauw.edu.

All three American Harp Foundation events, June 3--5, are free and open to the public.

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