The Accompanists’ Guild of South Australia is proud to support two of the recent Geoffrey Parsons Award winners in their second program of works from the duo piano repertoire.

Michael Ierace and Amir Farid

Michael Ierace (2004 Award winner) and Amir Farid (2007 Award winner) first met in Adelaide in 2005 as state representatives and competitors in the MBS National Final of the Young Performer of the Year Award. South Australian, Michael, took out the prize on that occasion and soon after won the premier awards from the Elder Conservatorium — the Elder Overseas Scholarship and the David Galliver Award.

Victorian, Amir won significant awards including the Piano Trio prize at the 2005 Australian Chamber Music Competition with the Benaud Trio ( now a successful chamber ensemble with its own national subscription series) , as an accompanist, for best pianist at the 2006 Mietta Song Recital and, as a soloist, winning the 2006 Australian National Piano Award.

Michael and Amir took up post graduate positions at the Royal College of Music in London. By coincidence they both studied with the same teacher, Professor Andrew Ball. Their musical partnership arose as a result of their RCM studies – as Amir said…

I guess it was an ideal situation to be in to form a duo —two Aussie pianist friends studying at the same institution with the same teacher with a duo piano subject on offer for credit towards our postgraduate course.  Why not? Michael agreed – being an avid chamber musician he commented that he hadn’t ……. done much duo work and most of the rep is great stuff!

Australia’s newest virtuoso piano duo performed their first recital in July 2009 in Adelaide. The second recital was prepared for 2010 in Melbourne (July 25) and Adelaide (August 24). The program includes Mozart’s Two Piano Sonata, the Brahms Haydn Variations and Rachmaninoff’s Second Suite.

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Dear Members of the Media

Please find attached a media release announcing the 3 2010 Finalists in the Accompanists’ Guild of SA’s The Geoffrey Parsons Award:

The three finalists who are competing for cash prizes of $4,000 are:
Karl Geiger (Linden Park, SA)
Andrew Georg (Pt Pirie, SA)
Chris Lian-Lloyd (Paradise, SA)

They will present their programs with the set work of a Schubert Lied, which they’ll perform with NZ tenor, Patrick Power. The 2010 Geoffrey Parsons Awards Final takes place this Saturday, 3 July, 7pm at the Hartley Concert Room, Elder Conservatorium of Music, The University of Adelaide.

Accompanists’ Guild of SA in association with the Elder Conservatorium of Music presents The 2010 Geoffrey Parsons Award

Saturday July 3, 7.00pm

Hartley Concert Room, The University of Adelaide, Kintore Avenue, Adelaide

TICKETS $15/$10/$5 Festival and Conference ticket holders free
BOOKINGS No pre-bookings, tickets at the door.

PUBLIC ENQUIRIES Accompanists’ Guild of SA (08) 8431 6030
MEDIA ENQUIRIES Christopher Wainwright 0438 829 728, cmwain@gmail.com

Kind regards

Chris Wainwright

A downloadable copy of this release can be found here

The Accompanists’ Guild of SA Media Release

Adelaide: 17 February 2010 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The Accompanists’ Guild of South Australia invites interested pianists to enter one of Australia’s most prestigious prizes for Accompanists, The Geoffrey Parsons Award.

The Geoffrey Parsons Award is named in memory of the Guild’s founding international patron, Australian accompanist Geoffrey Parsons, who died in 1995. For 45 years Geoffrey lived in London where he was an acclaimed accompanist particularly for singers. He regularly accompanied Elizabeth Schwarkzopf, Victoria de los Angeles, Dame Janet Baker, Olaf Bär, Yvonne Kenny and Barbara Bonney.

The competition occurs in two parts, an audition in which competitors perform works of their own choice with their own soloist, followed by a set song and sight reading with the Guild soloist. Three competitors from the auditions will be selected to perform in the Final.

Founder and Secretary of the Guild, Diana Harris says, “The set work chosen for the 2008 Geoffrey Parsons Award is Schubert’s Heimliches Lieben op. 106, no. 1. This song has been selected to assist the jury in testing several aspects of the accompanist’s art including technical proficiency, interpretative command, and above all, skills in vocal accompanying.”

Competitors will perform the set work with tenor Patrick Power, Lecturer in Voice at the University of Adelaide’s Elder Conservatorium of Music, who has sung most of the major lyric-tenor roles with opera companies in Europe and the USA. He has also been a regular guest with Opera Australia.

Chairing the jury will be the British pianist, vocal coach and opera expert Anthony Legge, who was a colleague and pupil of Geoffrey Parsons. In late 2008 Legge migrated to Sydney to fill the role of Associate Music Director with Opera Australia, following a distinguished career with English National Opera and the Royal Academy of Music, London. As a recitalist he has performed with singers including Dame Janet Baker, Dame Anne Evans, Sir Thomas Allen, Håken Hagegård and Robert Tear.

Joining Anthony Legge will be Adelaide pianist, composer, music educator and critic Stephen Whittington and Berenice Harrison, respected pianist, educator and administrator. 

Recent winners of The Geoffrey Parsons Award include: Mark Sandon (2009), Amanda Hodder (2008), Amir Farid (2007) and Anthony Hunt (2006). Since receiving their awards they have all achieved many successes and have become respected and “in demand” ensemble pianists, accompanists and repetiteurs.

The Geoffrey Parsons Award is presented in association with the Elder Conservatorium of Music, University of Adelaide.

Entry forms for The 2010 Geoffrey Parsons Award are now available from the Guild’s website: http://www.accompanist.org.au. For further info, ring: (08) 8431 6030 or (08) 8266 4936.

ENDS.

IMPORTANT DATES FOR THE 2010 GEOFFREY PARSONS AWARD

Media Contact: Christopher Wainwright 0438 829 728, cmwain@gmail.com

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