Music at St. Paul’s Presents The Judaic Muse, with Pianist José López
Jose Lopez
Sunday, August 18, 2019, 3pm (pre-concert conversation with Dr. José López at 2:30pm)
Boca Raton, FL – On Sunday, August 18, Music at St. Paul’s begins its 32nd Season with a recital titled, “The Judaic Muse.” Featuring celebrated Cuban-American pianist José López, the program features piano works by composers of Jewish heritage. Works to be performed include Judith Shatin’s Chai Variations on Eliahu HaNavi; selections from Fanny Hensel’s (née Mendelssohn) Das Jahr; Ferdinand Hiller’s Piano Sonata in A-flat Major, Op. 59; Charles Valentin Alkan’s Nocturne in B major, Op. 22 and Symphony, Op. 39.
Tickets for the concert are $20 (18 and under are FREE) and are only available at the door on the day of the concert. For more information on this event and Music at St. Paul’s 32nd Season, visit music.stpaulsdelray.org. St. Paul’s is handicapped accessible.
About the performer…
José López is Associate Professor and Coordinator of the Keyboard Studies Program at Florida International University in Miami; President of the South Florida Chapter of the American Liszt Society; and was recently appointed Honorary Secretary of The Alkan Society, based in London. He has performed throughout the United States, Italy and Central and South America with orchestras, in solo recitals, and with chamber groups in summer festivals such as the Music Festival of the Hamptons in New York and the Killington Music Festival in Vermont. Active throughout South Florida, he has been a featured performer in the Florida International University’s Music Festival; ISCM New Music Miami Festival, the Palm Beach Chamber Music Festival, Coral Gables’ Mainly Mozart Series, University of Miami’s Festival Miami, and as founder and co-director of the Deering Estate at Cutler’s “Chamber Concert Series,” entering its 12th year.
Lopez’s recently released solo CD’s on the Toccata Classics label are currently receiving positive and exciting reviews from major publications throughout the world. Vol. I of Alkan’s complete piano transcriptions of selected Mozart works elicited praise from critic Paul Driver of the Sunday Times (London), who wrote: “Alkan’s complete piano transcriptions of Mozart’s music make a sequence both diverting and profound. Lopez, who in the booklet explains Alkan’s treatment of the D minor Piano Concerto, K466, in extraordinary detail, plays captivatingly. One doesn’t miss the orchestra at all.”
López’s recording of the complete solo piano music by Riccardo Malipiero, released in the summer of 2012, has also received favorable reviews by critic Tim Smith in The Baltimore Sun, in Music Web International and in Fanfare magazine.
His upcoming world premiere CD release on Toccata Classics of operatic transcriptions and solo works of 19th-century Cuban-born composer Nicolás Ruíz Espadero (1832-1890) will compliment a planned publication of Espadero’s unpublished Transcendental Etudes, scheduled for publication on the Cuban Musical Patrimony series in fall 2019. On Toccata Classics, López initiated a series dedicated to ‘forgotten’ Cuban composers, launching a CD of solo piano works by José Comellas (1842-1888) in 2016.
Born in Cuba into an immigrant family of Spanish, Basque and Sephardic ancestry, José emigrated to the United States at a young age. He received his MM and DMA degrees from the University of Miami School of Music, where he studied with Dr. Rosalina Sackstein, a former pupil of Claudio Arrau and Rafael de Silva. He has recorded for SNE, Albany, Innova and Toccata Classics record labels.
