Lisa Bergman
A passionate promoter of classical music, Lisa Bergman is the Classical Music Program Advisor of the Icicle Creek Center for the Arts in Leavenworth, founder and Artistic Director of the Mostly Nordic Chamber Music Series presented at the Nordic Heritage Museum in Seattle as well as Executive Director of NOISE (Northwest Opera in Schools, Etcetera). Bergman was recently hired as a radio announcer on Classic KING-FM in Seattle, streaming worldwide on the internet.
Lisa is also a concert pianist specializing in the fields of collaborative piano and chamber music, and is a graduate of the Juilliard School, the State University of New York at Stony Brook and the University of Washington, cum laude. She served as an Artist in Residence and member of the University of Washington Music Faculty (1989-1999) teaching in the fields of accompanying and opera coaching. As a recording artist her discography includes six chamber music CDs and one solo CD. She served as Artistic Director of the Methow Chamber Music Festival 2003-2006. As 1996 American Artistic Ambassadors, Bergman and violinist Ann Christensen were selected by the United States Information Agency to represent the U.S. on a seven-week tour of New Zealand, Nepal, Korea, Taiwan, Mongolia and China. She made her Carnegie Recital Hall debut in 1983.
Bergman was recently selected as a member of the Hall of Fame for the Washington State Music Teachers Association for “extraordinary service, outstanding musicianship, dedication and leadership which have significantly contributed to the development and growth of music education in the State of Washington.”
“What I liked especially was her sense of authority and command…she plays the piano as if she owned it.” R. M. Campbell, The Seattle PI
Jane Harty
Jane Harty is an active and diverse recitalist of solo piano and chamber music repertoire. She holds a D.M.A. degree from the University of Southern California, and studied at L’Ecole Normale de Musique in Paris. Her teachers have included Blanche Bascourret de Gueraldi, a student of Cortot; and Johanna Graudan, a student of Schnabel. She was also a participant in the classes of Nadia Boulanger. In addition to her duties on the piano faculty at Pacific Lutheran University, she is the Artistic Director of Music Northwest in Seattle, and has appeared in recital with members of the Seattle Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Northwest Sinfonietta, and blues, jazz and world musicians. She is also the Director of two chamber music camps, one for students and one for adults. She is the grand-niece of Sir Hamilton Harty, the “Irish Toscanini,” and is a specialist in his songs and chamber music.
Her duties at P.L.U. have included private instruction in piano performance and accompanying; and classes in chamber music, piano pedagogy and piano literature. Her teaching philosophy is eclectic, incorporating kinesthetic experience with intellectual understanding of the score, the ultimate goal being to achieve artistic musical expression at every level of study. As a solo pianist her repertoire is broad-based from Mozart and Beethoven, Chopin and Brahms, Debussy and Ravel, to Elliott Carter. She is also a harpsichordist and Bach specialist. She has served on the P.L.U. faculty since 1978.
Alexandre Dossin
Considered by Martha Argerich an “extraordinary musician” and by the international critic a “phenomenon” and “a master of contrasts,” Alexandre Dossin keeps an active performing, recording and teaching careers.
Born in Porto Alegre, Brazil, where he lived until he was 19, Alexandre spent nine years studying in Moscow, Russia, before establishing residency in the United States.Currently a tenured professor at the University of Oregon School of Music, Alexandre Dossin is a graduate from the University of Texas-Austin and the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Russia. He studied with Hubertus Hofmann and Dirce Knijnik at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul in Porto Alegre, with Boris Romanov (Merzliakovsky Pre-Conservatory School in Moscow) and was assistant of Sergei Dorensky at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory (Moscow, Russia) and Willliam Race and Gregory Allen at University of Texas at Austin (USA).
A prizewinner in several international piano competitions, Dossin received the First Prize and the Special Prize at the 2003 Martha Argerich International Piano Competition in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Other international awards include the Silver Medal and second Honorable Mention in the Maria Callas Grand Prix, and Third Prize and Special Prize in the Mozart International Piano Competition, in addition to several prizes in Brazil.
He performed numerous live recitals for public radio in Texas, Wisconsin, Washington and Illinois, including returning engagements at the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concert Series. Dossin has performed in over twenty countries, including international festivals in Japan, Canada, United States, Brazil and Argentina, in some occasions sharing the stage with Martha Argerich.
He has CDs released by Musicians Showcase Recording (Alexandre Dossin, 2002), Blue Griffin (A Touch of Brazil, 2005), and Naxos (Verdi-Liszt Paraphrases, 2007, Kabalevsky Complete Sonatas, 2009, Kabalevsky Complete Preludes, 2009, Russian Transcriptions, 2012) praised in reviews by Diapason, The Financial Times, Fanfare Magazine, American Record Guide, Clavier and other international publications. Conductors with whom he has performed include Charles Dutoit, Isaac Karabtchevsky, Keith Clark and Michael Gielen, with orchestras including the Porto Alegre Symphony Orchestra, Buenos Aires Philharmonic, Brazilian National Symphony, Mozarteum University Symphony, Petrobrás Symphony and Tchaikovsky Conservatory Symphony Orchestras. Alexandre Dossin was featured in the main interview and on the cover of Clavier magazine (May, 2008) and is an editor and recording artist for Schirmer Performance Editions series (Tchaikovsky’s The Seasons in 2009, Tchaikovsky’s Album for the Young and Prokofiev’s Visions Fugitives in 2010, Liszt Consolations and Liebesträume, 2011, Rachmaninoff Preludes op. 3/2 and op. 23, 2012).
Dossin is a member of the Board of Directors of the American Liszt Society and the President of the Oregon Chapter of the American Liszt Society. He lives in Eugene with his wife Maria and children Sophia and Victor. Further info: www.dossin.net.
Steven Spooner
Described as “dazzling” (Washington Post) critics have hailed the powerful performances of pianist Steven Spooner and noted that the “American had everything: polished technique, musical intelligence, innate sensitivity, and a personality that reaches across the keyboard.” Steven has performed around the world and is quickly becoming one of the more noted American pianists of his generation. He has given solo recitals at prestigious venues such as the Salle Cortot in Paris, Holland’s Vredenburg Centre, Budapest’s Great Hall of the Liszt Academy, Geneva’s Fete de la Musique and numerous halls across Europe, Latin America, South America, and the United States. Recently, he made his Carnegie Hall recital debut in a tour sponsored by the Hungarian Government and this season will perform in Rome (Academia Santa Cecilia), New York (Carnegie Weill Recital Hall), Washington D.C. (National Gallery of Art), Jakarta, Singapore (Esplanade Recital Hall), Budapest, Italy, and throughout Asia.
Steven has been unusually successful in the limited number of international piano competitions in which he participated—he is prizewinner at each of the seven international piano competitions he has entered and top prizewinner at both the Hilton Head International Piano Competition and the Artlivre International Piano Competition. He captured First Prize and was recipient of the Niekamp Career Grant as most outstanding pianist in French music at the Paris Conservatory. Steven is an active chamber collaborator and has performed with a diverse and distinguished list of vocalists and instrumentalists including, Silk Road Ensemble Bassist Daxun Zhang, former Philadelphia Orchestra Trombonist, M. Dee Stewart, Baritone Chris Thompson, and prize-winning violinist Leor Maltinsky. Dr. Spooner’s orchestral engagements include performances with the Danubia Symphony Orchestra, Brevard Symphony Orchestra, Crescent City Symphony, New Orleans Civic Symphony, Ozark Chamber Orchestra, and recent performances with the Chamber Orchestra Kremlin during their tour of North America.
Dr. Spooner has released 14 recordings on the EMR Classics, Everythingmusic and IU recording labels. He has studied at Paris Conservatory, Moscow and Tbilisi Conservatories in the former Soviet Union, and earned his doctorate at Indiana University, Bloomington. Steven was the final recipient of the Ivory Classics Foundation prize that enabled him to study with the legendary virtuoso Earl Wild.
He has served as guest artist-in-residence at Paris Conservatory Summer Sessions and has been appointed to the Artist Faculty of the Amalfi Coast Music Festival in Italy, the International Institute for Young Musicians, and the Adam Gyorgy Castle Academy in Budapest. Dr. Spooner is increasingly in demand for his engaging and energetic masterclasses at major music institutions all over the world such as the Paris Conservatory, Milan Conservatory, Liszt Academy of Music, and the Shanghai and Beijing Conservatories. Steven currently serves on the piano faculty at the University of Kansas and specializes in workshops and lectures on a variety of performance and pedagogical topics. A dedicated and caring teacher, Steven’s students have been named winners of several prizes at national and international piano competitions. Steven Spooner is a Steinway Artist. Further info: www.stevenspooner.com.