Two Guest Pianists Join Percussion Plus Project for February 18 Concert

February 7, 2007

February 7, 2007, Greencastle, Ind. - The Percussion Plus Project, an ensemble in residence at DePauw University, presents its third campus concert of the season on Sunday afternoon, February 18, at 3 p.m. in Kresge Auditorium of the Performing Arts Center. The audience for the concert -- which is presented free of charge to the public -- is invited to sit on the stage.

Entitled "Beyond Bartok: Works for Percussion Plus Two Pianos," the program will feature guest pianists Vergie Amendola (pictured below right) and Tanya Gille (seen at top left) in three pieces that pay homage to Bela Bartok's landmark 1937 work Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion.

Works will include Witold Lutoslawski's well-known Variations on a Theme of Paganini in a version featuring added percussion by Marta Ptaszynska, followed by the Midwest premiere of David Crumb's Harmonia Mundi. The program will conclude with Danish composer Kim Helweg's America Fantasy. Based on themes and motives from Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story, the work is a true tour de force for each member of the ensemble.

Guest pianist Vergie Amendola, professor of piano at the University of Northern Colorado, is joined by guest pianist Tanya Gille, professor of piano at the University of Alabama. They have performed with the Percussion Plus Project at the Prague Spring Festival, the European Month of Culture in Ljubljana, and at DePauw during the 2003 residency of Music of the 21st Century guest composer George Crumb. They are joined by percussionists Amy Lynn Barber, artistic director of Percussion Plus Project, as well as Christopher Martin.

The program that will entertain a DePauw audience on the 18th will be repeated later this semester at the University of Alabama and will be featured at the International Conference of the Music Teachers National Association and the Canadian Federation of Music Teachers in Toronto.

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