Pianist Marina Lomazov at center stage perfoming Grieg's Piano Concerto with orchestra

A well-known piano concerto will be performed by a popular and dynamic pianist at the next University of South Carolina Symphony Orchestra concert. The Tuesday, Nov. 13 concert will feature Marina Lomazov performing the Piano Concerto in A minor, op. 16 by Edvard Grieg.

The Piano Concerto is Grieg’s best-known work and among the most-performed piano concerti. The opening bars – a roar of tympani and dazzling piano entrance – are immediately recognizable even to a casual classical music listener.

"The Grieg is a quintessential romantic concerto with broad emotional range and brilliant piano writing, combined with beautiful lyricism and atmosphere," said Dr. Lomazov, a Steinway Artist. "It is a virtuosic piece of music that requires endurance, pacing and wide range of sound and color."

This will be the first time she has performed the concerto in Columbia.

Performances by Dr. Lomazov in the Southeast frequently sell out and she also had the same impact recently in China. Her extensive summer tour there culminated in a sold-out concert at the Shanghai City Theater. Talk Magazine Shanghai called her performance "a dramatic blend of boldness and wit." She has also performed throughout North America and South America, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Austria, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Russia and Japan and been soloist with the Boston Pops, the Rochester Philharmonic, the Chernigov Philharmonic (Ukraine), the KUG Orchester Graz (Austria), the Bollington Festival Orchestra (England) and the Piccolo Spoleto Festival Orchestra. Her concerts have been broadcast on National Public Radio’s Performance Today, the Bravo cable channel and WNYC’s Young Artist Showcase.

A native of Ukraine, Dr. Lomazov studied at the Kiev Conservatory before immigrating to the U.S. where she earned degrees from the Juilliard School and the Eastman School of Music. She is an associate professor at the USC School of Music and Artistic Director of the Southeastern Piano Festival.

The Grieg concerto won international fame after its 1869 premiere. Franz Liszt was a fan of the concerto and provided suggestions for improvements which the composer incorporated.  In 1909 it became the first piano concerto ever recorded and portions of it have been used in everything from Nike commercials to the movies Lolita and The Adventures of Milo and Otis.

"It's a thrill to perform a widely-known piece of music - its beauty is the foundation of its universal appeal,” Dr. Lomazov said. “Whether one hears it for the first or for the hundredth time, the work stands strong and fresh on its own." 

The concert will open with the Overture to The Creatures of Prometheus ballet by Ludwig van Beethoven. The ballet and the full score have rarely been performed since the premiere in 1801, but the five-minute overture has become a concert mainstay.

“It is very quick and lively – a great opening for a concert,” said orchestra Music Director Donald Portnoy.

The overture will be followed by Richard Strauss’ Death and Transfiguration (Tod und Verklärung), Op. 24, a tone poem depicting the death of an artist. Although only 26 when he wrote the work in 1898 it was his third great symphonic poem. For the first time, he provided a details synopsis of the narrative the music expressed – the final hours of “a man who had striven for the highest ideals…”

“Strauss is one of the mainstays of the orchestral repertoire,” said Maestro Portnoy. “It isn’t played that often because it’s not easy, but it is something the orchestra needs to play and audiences need to experience.”

The concert takes place at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 13 at the Koger Center for the Arts, Assembly Street at College Street. Tickets are $25; $20 for USC faculty and staff, seniors and military; and $8 for students. Call (803) 251-2222 or go to http://www.capitoltickets.com/.