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Asiya Korepanova
Photography: Emil MatveevThe UAB Piano Series at the University of Alabama at Birmingham will present Asiya Korepanova, Marina Lomazov and Kenny Broberg for the 2021-22 season.
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. Performances are held in UAB’s Alys Stephens Performing Arts Center, Reynolds-Kirschbaum Recital Hall.
Safety is UAB’s priority. The pandemic is a fluid situation that UAB is monitoring, in consultation with infectious disease and public health experts; performances will be subject to change based on the latest COVID-19 safety guidelines. Event staff and attendees are required to wear masks indoors on campus regardless of vaccination status, as well as maintain proper distancing while on UAB’s campus, including at events.
Oct. 10
UAB Piano Series presents Asiya Korepanova
Pianist Asiya Korepanova will open the season with a performance in UAB’s Alys Stephens Performing Arts Center at 4 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 10. Her program will be Franz Liszt’s Complete 24 Etudes, “Highly virtuosic and spectacular,” Kasman said. Tickets are $15, $5 for students through grade 12 and UAB employees, and free to UAB students. For tickets, call the ASC Box Office at 205-975-2787 or visit AlysStephens.org.
Korepanova is 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. She is a pianistic powerhouse, and because 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, according to her artist’s statement. Her contributions to the solo piano literature — including her historic solo piano transcription of Richard Strauss’ “Ein Heldenleben” and those of Rachmaninoff’s Cello Sonata and Mussorgsky’s “Songs and Dances of Death” — have given her a place among today’s formidable transcribers. Korepanova’s transcriptions have been recorded through her YouTube vlog project, “Midnight Pieces,” which features 53 performances of short works including well-known and obscure works, Russian compositions, and original transcriptions.
Her uninhibited artistic expression has culminated in several projects featuring original poetry and visual art that serve as an interpretive commentary to a particular cycle of piano works. These cycles include Liszt’s Transcendental Etudes, Bach’s “Well-Tempered Clavier,”
Tchaikovsky’s 18 Morceaux, Op. 72 and, most recently, Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition.” Korepanova’s live performances of these compositions have astounded audiences and organizers alike.
She was born in Izhevsk, Russia, to a musical family and at age 4 began to learn piano 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, Korepanova made her orchestral debut, playing Mozart’s Concerto No. 8 with her own cadenza, and performed her first philharmonic recital.
Marina Lomazov
Photography: Keith TrammelJan. 23, 2022
UAB Piano Series presents Marina Lomazov
Pianist Marina Lomazov will perform for the UAB Piano Series’ second recital at 4 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 23, 2022, in UAB’s Alys Stephens Performing Arts Center. Tickets are $15, $5 for students through grade 12 and UAB employees, and free to UAB students. For tickets, call the ASC Box Office at 205-975-2787 or visit AlysStephens.org.
Lomazov, a Ukrainian-American pianist, has established herself as one of the most passionate and charismatic performers on the concert scene today. She has been praised by critics as “a diva of the piano” (The Salt Lake City Tribune), “a mesmerizing risk-taker” (The Plain Dealer, Cleveland) and “simply spectacular” (Chicago International Music Foundation), according to her biography.
Following prizes in the Cleveland International Piano Competition, William Kapell International Piano Competition, Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition and Hilton Head International Piano Competition, Lomazov has given performances throughout North America, South America, China, England, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Austria, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Russia, Japan and in nearly all the 50 states in the United States.
Before immigrating to the United States in 1990, Lomazov studied at the Kiev Conservatory, where she became the youngest first-prize winner at the all-Kiev Piano Competition. She holds degrees from the Juilliard School and the Eastman School of Music, the latter bestowing upon her the highly coveted Artist’s Certificate — an honor the institution had not given a pianist for nearly two decades.
Lomazov is a professor of piano at the Eastman School of Music. She has served as jury member for the Cleveland International (Young Artists), Hilton Head International and Eastman International piano competitions, Minnesota International Piano e-Competition, and National Federation Biennial Young Artist Auditions and is currently serving as a chair for National Classical Music Panel for YoungArts, the only organization in the United States that nominates U.S. Presidential Scholars in the Arts. For 17 years, she served on the faculty of the University of South Carolina School of Music, where she held the chair of Ira McKissick Koger Professor of Fine Arts Music and currently holds a guest artist residency. Together with her husband and piano duo partner Joseph Rackers, she co-founded and serves as co-artistic director of the Southeastern Piano Festival in Columbia, South Carolina.
Kenny Broberg
Photography: Jeremy EnlowMarch 27, 2022
UAB Piano Series presents Kenny Broberg
Pianist Kenny Broberg will perform for the UAB Piano Series at 4 p.m. Sunday, March 27, 2022, in UAB’s Alys Stephens Performing Arts Center. Tickets are $15, $5 for students through grade 12 and UAB employees, and free to UAB students. For tickets, call the ASC Box Office at 205-975-2787 or visit AlysStephens.org.
Winner of the 2021 American Pianists Awards, Broberg continues to build a reputation as “one of the most intelligent and intense artists on the concert stage today” (Theater Jones) with fresh interpretations complemented by a natural, honest stage presence. The Minneapolis native first came to international attention when he captured the silver medal at the 2017 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition with performances marked by “an imaginative shaping of themes, revelation of inner voices, and an unfailing sense of momentum” (Texas Classical Review). He followed this with a bronze medal win at the 2019 International Tchaikovsky Competition, adding to previous prizes at the Hastings, Sydney, Seattle and NewOrleans International Piano Competitions.
Lauded for “the ability to build a strikingly imaginative and intelligent program … [leading] his audience through a superbly conceived, brilliantly executed journey” (Theater Jones), Broberg enjoys juxtaposing the novel and familiar, bringing light to lesser‐known works alongside classic repertoire. Recent and upcoming highlights include his Spivey Hall debut; a tour of rural Australian communities, along with a return to Sydney; residencies at the Mariinsky International Piano, Stars on the Baikal, Strings and Sunriver Music Festivals; and recitals in Yokohama, Nagoya, Moscow, New York and Los Angeles.
The first musician in his family, Broberg started piano lessons at age 6, when he was first fascinated by his mother’s upright — a wedding gift from her parents. He studied for nine years with Dr. Joseph Zins before entering the University of Houston’s Moores School of Music, where he earned a Bachelor of Music degree with Nancy Weems in 2016. He currently resides in Kansas City, Missouri, where he continues to be mentored by 2001 Cliburn Gold Medalist Stanislav Ioudenitch at the International Center for Music at Park University. Alongside his teachers, he is influenced by the recordings of Alfred Cortot, William Kapell and Claudio Arrau.