Asiya KorepanovaPianist Asiya Korepanova will open the UAB Piano Series at the University of Alabama at Birmingham with a performance Tuesday, Oct. 22.
Korepanova will perform Beethoven’s 15 Variations and Fugue (“Eroica” variations), Liszt’s Concert Paraphrase of Wagner’s “Tannhauser” Overture, and her own, first ever solo piano transcription of Rachmaninoff’s Sonata for Cello and Piano.
The UAB Piano Series, presented by the College of Arts and Sciences’ Department of Music, brings the world’s finest pianists to Birmingham. Distinguished Professor of Piano and Artist-in-Residence Yakov Kasman, DMA, a Van Cliburn medalist, directs the series.
The 7 p.m. performance will be in UAB’s Alys Stephens Performing Arts Center, Reynolds-Kirschbaum Recital Hall. Tickets are $15, $5 for students through grade 12 and UAB employees, or free to UAB students. For tickets, call the ASC Box Office at 205-975-2787 or visit AlysStephens.org.
The only pianist currently performing Liszt’s 24 Etudes as a single program and one of few to tout a concerto list that features more than 60 works, Korepanova is a pianistic powerhouse and rapidly rising star. As a result of her uncompromising dedication to the arts, Korepanova is recognized not only for her achievements as a pianist, but also for her work as a transcriber, composer, visual artist and poet. Her contributions to the solo piano literature — including her historic solo piano transcription of Richard Strauss’ “Ein Heldenleben” and that of Rachmaninoff’s Cello Sonata — have given her a place among today’s formidable transcribers.
A number of her transcriptions have been recorded through her YouTube vlog project, “Midnight Pieces.” Korepanova shared 53 performances of short works by 53 composers. Among these are well-known works, Russian compositions, obscure works and original transcriptions.
Uninhibited in her artistic expression, Korepanova has created several projects featuring original poetry and visual art as an interpretive commentary to a particular cycle of works for the piano, including Liszt’s Transcendental Etudes, Bach’s “Well-Tempered Clavier” and Tchaikovsky’s 18 Morceaux, Op. 72.
In 2017, she founded Festival Baltimore, a two-week chamber music series and summer academy dedicated to the performance and study of complete cycles. Rapidly growing in reputation, the festival has already solidified its reputation as a highly original musical series and academy. Korepanova also founded Music for Minds, a nonprofit organization that promotes classical performances in classrooms and founds and supports music festivals featuring unique programming.
Korepanova was born in Izhevsk, Russia, to a musical family. She began to learn piano when she was 4 years old from her mother, her first piano teacher. She was taught to read music in orchestral clefs by her father, an exemplary composer, at the age of 6, and started composing her own music. At 9, she made her orchestral debut, playing Mozart’s Concerto No.8 with her own cadenza, and performed her first philharmonic recital. In 2012, she moved to the United States at the invitation of renowned pianist Santiago Rodriguez. Later that year, she was awarded the Gold Medal at the Nina Wideman International Piano Competition, an accolade that proved invaluable in the establishment of her concertizing career in the United States.