Rebecca Penneys, piano

The Williams College Department of Music presents Rebecca Penneys, piano on Tuesday, October 17 at 8 p.m. in Brooks-Rogers Recital Hall on the Williams College campus. There is also a piano master class featuring talented Williams student pianists on Monday, Oct. 16 at 4:15 p.m. in the Brooks-Rogers Recital Hall. These free events are open to the public.

Presenting a program of the riches of keyboard repertoire, Rebecca Penneys plays music of Soler, Scarlatti, Brahms, and Chopin. She concludes her performance with rags by Williams Albright and William Bolcom.

About Rebecca Penneys

Pianist Rebecca Penneys is a recitalist, chamber musician, orchestral soloist, educator and adjudicator. Forover six decades she has been hailed as a pianist of prodigious talent. Rebecca has played throughout the USA, East Asia, Australia, New Zealand, South America, Europe, Middle East and Canada. A Steinway Artist, she is a popular guest artist, keynote speaker and celebrated teacher. Combining concerts with seminars and master classes worldwide, she taught at Eastman School of Music for thirty-seven years and at Chautauqua Music Festival for thirty-four years. Her prior positions were at Milwaukee Conservatory of Music (1974-1980) and North Carolina School of the Arts (1972-1974). Her current and former students include prizewinners in international competitions, and hold important teaching posts on every continent.

In July 2017, Rebecca became Professor Emerita of Piano at Eastman School of Music. She is Artist-in- Residence at St. Petersburg College (2001- present), and holds a courtesy position as Steinway-Artist- in-Residence at the University of South Florida (2015- present). She is director of the St Petersburg College Piano Series in Florida (2007-present), pianist of the Salon Chamber Music Series at the Rochester Academy of Medicine (1997-present) and founder-director of Eastman Piano Series at the Summit (2009- present). Rebecca launched the Rebecca Penneys Friends of Piano (non-profit 501c3) and the Rebecca Penneys Piano Festival in 2013. The University of South Florida in Tampa hosts the tuition-free three-week festival every July. RPPF-Mini, a 5-day seminar about strategies for career development for pianists, will launch in January 2018 at St Petersburg College Gibbs Campus.

Rebecca made her recital debut at age 9, and performed as soloist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra when she was 11. At 17, after winning many young artist competitions in the USA she was awarded the unprecedented Special Critics’ Prize at the Seventh International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw, an award created in her honor. Additionally, she won the Most Outstanding Musician Prize at the Fifth Vianna Da Motta International Piano Competition (Portugal) and was top prizewinner in the Second Paloma O’Shea International Piano Competition (Spain). She made her New York Debut in Alice Tully Hall in 1972. In 1974, she founded the acclaimed New Arts Trio, which twice won the prestigious Naumburg Award for Chamber Music (New York City).

Rebecca’s teachers include Aube Tzerko, Leonard Stein, Rosina Lhevinne, Artur Rubinstein, Menahem Pressler, Gyorgy Sebok, Janos Starker, Josef Gingold, and Iannis Xenakis. She has taught and performed in such summer festivals as Sitka, Marlboro, Eastern, Aspen, Vermont Mozart, Montreal, Tel Hai Israel, Shawnigan Johannesen, Peninsula, Roycroft, Mammoth Lakes, Eastern, and Music Mountain. Rebecca has more than a dozen current CDs on Fleur De Son Classics and Centaur Records. Her 1st DVD for Naxos will be released in February 2018 with music of Brahms, Debussy and De Falla, and there are three more on the way.

Rebecca Penneys is presented by the Williams College Department of Music with the generous support of the W. Ford Schumann ’50 Performing Arts Endowment.