AUBURN - Displaying a physical dexterity that thrilled the audience, pianist Robert DeGaetano also showed a more relaxed side as he interspersed his virtuosity with a little of the history behind the music.
Jennifer Meyers / The Citizen
Robert DeGaetano addresses the crowd after performing Maurice Ravel's piece “Jeux d'Eau” during the Adams Foundation Piano Series Sunday at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Auburn.
Robert DeGaetano addresses the crowd after performing Maurice Ravel's piece “Jeux d'Eau” during the Adams Foundation Piano Series Sunday at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Auburn.
DeGaetano performed Sunday in the chapel of Westminster Presbyterian Church in Auburn, the first installment of the sixth annual Piano Series sponsored by the Adams Foundation. An audience of close to 200 attended.
The Adams Foundation, based in Santa Barbara, Calif., presents such well-known pianists in smaller communities throughout the nation. Auburn natives John and Richard Contigulia, highly-accomplished pianists themselves, have been instrumental in establishing these concerts, and were especially keen on such a tradition in their hometown.
Five years ago, DeGaetano played at the Emerson Auditorium at East Middle School. On Sunday, he praised the chapel at Westminster for its intimate setting and near-perfect acoustics.
Playing on a perfect spring day behind the loveliest of backdrops - Louis Comfort Tiffany's radiant Tiffany Rainbow Window - DeGaetano played selections from Claude Debussey, Maurice Ravel, Frederic Chopin, and American composer Samuel Barber. He also played two encores, each time after his walk from the stage was interrupted by raucous standing ovations.
“Ravel had this absolutely magical understanding of utilizing wonderful harmonies,” DeGaetano said, while Debussey's “L'Isle Joyeuse” is one of his “favorite pieces of music of all time because it is so sensual. He was in love at the time, and he wrote this beautiful piece.”
Kris Kooi, a senior at Auburn High School, will be studying piano at Cornell University's Arts and Sciences College next fall. He's been learning the piano for nearly 10 years.
“It was all very good,” Kooi said during intermission. Kooi, a finalist in the prestigious National Merit Scholarship competition, would like to teach music at the university level.
As for DeGaetano, he is a New York City native and a graduate of its most famous teaching ground for music, the Juilliard School. He made his NYC recital debut at Lincoln Center and since has toured in each of the 50 states and around the world.
His debut at Carnegie Hall came in 1999 and he currently has a catalog of eight CDs on the Crystonyx label.
His latest work is entitled th Century Piano Sonatas,” and includes Barber's “Sonata for Piano.” DeGaetano played the impressive piece Sunday.
DeGaetano also performed one of his own compositions, a work simply called “Gratitude.”He wrote it during an introspective three years living in the woods of the northern Catskills.
“I was only going to be there a couple of months, but then I learned so much from being alone, and being away from the world, that I decided to stay on. I didn't think I would stay on for three years, but I did,” said DeGaetano, his voice still carrying a strong hint of his NYC background.
He added that because of having had “so many, many gifts, both personally and professionally over the past year” he believed it appropriate to play a piece he hadn't performed very often during his career.
DeGaetano played several pieces from Chopin, including his well-known “Polonaise in A-Flat.” He also talked of how the Polish-born Chopin changed the world's understanding of the piano.
“We then moved into the Romantic age (the early 1800s), when the actual piano that we have today was built for the first time. And the reason for that was the steel frame - before that it couldn't be cast, so pianos had a wooden frame. And the wooden frame could only hold the strings so hard, and then they would break,” he said. “So most pianists never really developed the muscles to be playing these big pianos. They just developed their fingers.”
Not so with Chopin, who was a child prodigy. His “Nocturne in Eb” was written when he was just 12.
“He understood that there was a flexibility involved in the motions of the hands, and the wrists, and the muscles of the chest of the body. He just had this natural understanding of how to approach this big instrument,” DeGaetano said.
Ilko Spin, of Auburn, is an accomplished pianist himself, and has rarely missed a performance since the program's inception in 2002.
“It's great that the Adams Foundation, and the Cayuga Arts Council, offers the Auburn community such high-level solo classical piano, some of the most difficult music written for the piano. Technically and mentally, it's very, very difficult.”
The Adams Foundation, based in Santa Barbara, Calif., presents such well-known pianists in smaller communities throughout the nation. Auburn natives John and Richard Contigulia, highly-accomplished pianists themselves, have been instrumental in establishing these concerts, and were especially keen on such a tradition in their hometown.
Five years ago, DeGaetano played at the Emerson Auditorium at East Middle School. On Sunday, he praised the chapel at Westminster for its intimate setting and near-perfect acoustics.
Playing on a perfect spring day behind the loveliest of backdrops - Louis Comfort Tiffany's radiant Tiffany Rainbow Window - DeGaetano played selections from Claude Debussey, Maurice Ravel, Frederic Chopin, and American composer Samuel Barber. He also played two encores, each time after his walk from the stage was interrupted by raucous standing ovations.
“Ravel had this absolutely magical understanding of utilizing wonderful harmonies,” DeGaetano said, while Debussey's “L'Isle Joyeuse” is one of his “favorite pieces of music of all time because it is so sensual. He was in love at the time, and he wrote this beautiful piece.”
Kris Kooi, a senior at Auburn High School, will be studying piano at Cornell University's Arts and Sciences College next fall. He's been learning the piano for nearly 10 years.
“It was all very good,” Kooi said during intermission. Kooi, a finalist in the prestigious National Merit Scholarship competition, would like to teach music at the university level.
As for DeGaetano, he is a New York City native and a graduate of its most famous teaching ground for music, the Juilliard School. He made his NYC recital debut at Lincoln Center and since has toured in each of the 50 states and around the world.
His debut at Carnegie Hall came in 1999 and he currently has a catalog of eight CDs on the Crystonyx label.
His latest work is entitled th Century Piano Sonatas,” and includes Barber's “Sonata for Piano.” DeGaetano played the impressive piece Sunday.
DeGaetano also performed one of his own compositions, a work simply called “Gratitude.”He wrote it during an introspective three years living in the woods of the northern Catskills.
“I was only going to be there a couple of months, but then I learned so much from being alone, and being away from the world, that I decided to stay on. I didn't think I would stay on for three years, but I did,” said DeGaetano, his voice still carrying a strong hint of his NYC background.
He added that because of having had “so many, many gifts, both personally and professionally over the past year” he believed it appropriate to play a piece he hadn't performed very often during his career.
DeGaetano played several pieces from Chopin, including his well-known “Polonaise in A-Flat.” He also talked of how the Polish-born Chopin changed the world's understanding of the piano.
“We then moved into the Romantic age (the early 1800s), when the actual piano that we have today was built for the first time. And the reason for that was the steel frame - before that it couldn't be cast, so pianos had a wooden frame. And the wooden frame could only hold the strings so hard, and then they would break,” he said. “So most pianists never really developed the muscles to be playing these big pianos. They just developed their fingers.”
Not so with Chopin, who was a child prodigy. His “Nocturne in Eb” was written when he was just 12.
“He understood that there was a flexibility involved in the motions of the hands, and the wrists, and the muscles of the chest of the body. He just had this natural understanding of how to approach this big instrument,” DeGaetano said.
Ilko Spin, of Auburn, is an accomplished pianist himself, and has rarely missed a performance since the program's inception in 2002.
“It's great that the Adams Foundation, and the Cayuga Arts Council, offers the Auburn community such high-level solo classical piano, some of the most difficult music written for the piano. Technically and mentally, it's very, very difficult.”
Citizen
Hot Jobs
New! Off the Menu
The Citizens' Say
Post your comment - click hereThere are No comments posted.