Piano professor Zimdars releases new album

Richard Zimdars, Despy Karlas Professor of Piano at the Hugh Hodgson School of Music, will perform a lecture-recital surveying the contents of his new album, Piano Character Pieces from Four Continents, at 7:00 p.m. on Sunday, April 12. The event, which takes place in the Hodgson School’s Edge Recital Hall, will be followed by a CD signing and light refreshments in the adjacent Choral Suite.

“My teachers had working associations with composers such as Bartok, Kodaly, Hindemith, Milhaud, Barber, and Wuorinen,” said Zimdars. “By recording music by five living composers, I continue part of their legacy, which was a committed concern for the future of music composition.”

The album features six compositions, five of which are world premiere recordings. Four of the album’s selections were composed post-2007, including Five Bagatelles by UGA professor of composition and native Australian Natalie Williams. In addition to the Bagatelles, the album also features Expressions, Op. 81 by Alexander Tcherepnin (Russia); Evening Music—Summer by William Matthews (United States); Watching and Chasing by former University of Georgia DMA student Ji Eun Moon (South Korea); Ballade by Gilad Cohen (Israel); and Transfigured Etudes by Huck Hodge (United States).

 “I’m pleased to record two works that were written for me, the Matthews, which I premiered in Ireland in 1974, and the Moon, premiered at UGA in 2010.  ” said Zimdars, whose CD release coincides with his retirement this May.  “One of the young composers featured, Huck Hodge, has already been a Guggenheim Fellow and holder of the Rome Prize at the American Academy in Rome.”

Students of Dr. Zimdars have won accolades at the national level, received the Fulbright Grant for piano study in Germany, and hold collegiate faculty positions in the United States, Brazil, Canada, and South Korea. He has performed and lectured in England, Ireland, Germany, Switzerland, Hungary, Brazil, Canada, and the United States. Writing in Fanfare Magazine of Zimdars’ 2009 Albany recording of Charles Ives’ Sonata No. 1, James North said: “Of the several pianists who have essayed it on records, only Joanna MacGregor…has come close to Zimdars…her performance does not leave us shaking our heads in wonder, as this one does.”

Support for Piano Character Pieces from Four Continents was made possible by the University of Georgia Research Foundation and the Despy Karlas Piano Professorship.