Music center announces new home, upcoming performances Park International Center for Music Announces 2018-2019 Season and Performance Home of the 1900 Building KANSAS CITY, MO Stanislav Ioudenitch, Artistic Director of Park International Center for Music (Park ICM), announced today that their 2018-2019 season would kick off in September with a new performance home, the 1900 Building in Mission Woods, Kansas. “For the first time, we will perform our entire season at the 1900 Building as we adore performing in their wonderful spaces,” said Ioudenitch. “Now between their two fabulous concert halls and their delicious restaurant, classical music lovers can have a full evening of fine wines and food, and cap it off with our world-class musicians! We are two hidden jewels just now being discovered in the Kansas City arts public.” High res photos can be found here. Park ICM has six different offerings this coming year for classical music lovers, all of which have incredible musicians coming to Kansas City from the world stage. As a part of the season and for the first time, three-selected guest artists, Vladimir Viardo (piano), Shmuel Ashkenasi (violin), and Dang Thai Son (piano) will be presenting an “educational” component as part of the concert. Those in attendance will get to observe and listen to the interaction between a master artist and a gifted ICM student in the preparation and performance of repertoire performed as part of the evening’s program. It’s an exclusive and rare opportunity to hear these world-class musicians in performance as well as coaching students in a concert format before an audience. The Park ICM 2018-2019 Performance Series includes: 1. Park ICM 1900 Series Featuring Vladimir Viardo, Piano, Friday, September 21, 7:30 p.m., 1900 Building, Mission Woods, Kansas Pianist Vladimir Viardo will create a rare opportunity for classical music lovers in Kansas City on Friday, September 21th, at the 1900 Building. The New York Times said of Viardo, “Mr. Viardo favors strong contrasts of mood, tempo, tone and dynamics, but he does not carry them to the point of caricature.” Born in 1949 at Krasnia Polana in the Caucasus, USSR, Vladimir Viardo studied with Irina Naumov at the Gnessin State Musical College and later studied with Lev Naumov at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory where Naumov would describe him as “my number one pupil.” During this time, he was tenured as a soloist by Moscow Philharmonia, the primary music organization of the USSR. After obtaining a doctorate, he was immediately engaged as assistant professor with Naumov at the Conservatory. At 21, Viardo took the third prize and the Prix du Prince Rainier at the Marguerite Long-Jacques Thibaud Competition, and in 1973 first prize at the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. He had already launched an impressive global career when his travel visa was mysteriously revoked. For nearly thirteen years, Viardo was a virtual prisoner of the Iron Curtain. During this closed period, he developed new horizons in his artistic achievements, vastly enlarging his repertoire, eventually including 37 concertos. Only when Mikhail Gorbachev rose to power in the Soviet Union was freedom to travel restored, and in 1987 Viardo was permitted to accept engagements in Germany and the United States. After returning to the West, his international career resumed with several concerts at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Kennedy Center, Salle Pleyel, and the Concertgebouw, and he has appeared as soloist with most of the important conductors including Lorin Maazel, Zubin Mehta, Vladimir Spivakov, Dmitri Kitayenko, Eduardo Mata, Anatoly Zatin, Kirill Kondrashin, and Krzysztof Penderecki. He joined the University of North Texas College of Music faculty as artist-in residence in 1989. An extraordinary and celebrated teacher, his international roster of students includes young artists from Eastern Europe, as well as Portugal, Spain, Mexico, South Africa, and the United States. Viardo’s master classes are much in demand throughout the world and his name appears in the book The Most Wanted Piano Teachers in the USA. Park ICM is thrilled to have this world- class master on stage to coach an ICM student right before the audience in this extraordinary educational opportunity. His performance will include Piano transcriptions of Schubert, Lieder by Liszt, and Debussy’s Second book of prelude. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXTUZvOoz9M 2. Park ICM 1900 Series Featuring Schmuel Ashkenasi, Violin, Thursday, October 11, 7:30 p.m., 1900 Building, Mission Woods, Kansas Born in Tel-Aviv in 1941, Schmuel Ashkenasi began his musical training at the Musical Academy of Tel-Aviv studying with legendary theater Ilona Feher. He arrived in the United States while still young and studied with Efrem Zimbalist at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Ashkenasi won the Young Concert Artists International Auditions in 1961 and in 1962 captured top prizes at the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, Russia, the Merriweather Post Competition in Washington, D.C., and the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition in Brussels, Belgium. He was 21 years old. As a soloist, he has toured the Soviet Union twice and plays concerts every year throughout Europe, Israel and the Far East. He has performed with famed American orchestras and many of the orchestras of Europe. In 1969, he formed the famed Vermeer Quartet and remained its first violinist throughout the quartet’s 39-year career, gaining a reputation as one of the world’s outstanding chamber musicians. Ashkenasi is also a noted teacher, currently holding posts of Professor of Violin at Bard College Conservatory of Music, Roosevelt University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts, and the Curtis Institute of Music. Schmuel Ashkenasi will be in concert with Lolita Lisovskaya-Sayevich, Park University Collaborative Artist, at the 1900 Building. Their program will include Sibelius’ 5 pieces for violin and piano Op.81, and other works. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSX11xaBAT0 3. Park ICM Distinguished Alumni Series Presents Behzod Abduraimov, Piano, Saturday, January 19, 2018, 7:30 p.m., 1900 Building, Mission Woods, Kansas Described by The New York Times as the “master of all he surveys” and with The Washington Post noting to “keep your ear on this one,” Abduraimov’s captivating performances continue to receive international praise. Following his debut success at Carnegie Hall in 2015, recent seasons have seen Abduraimov work with leading orchestras worldwide. An award-winning recording artist, he released his first concerto disc in 2014 on Decca Classics which features Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No.3 and Tchaikovsky’s Concerto No.1 with the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della Rai under Juraj Valčuha. His debut recital CD won both the Choc de Classica and the Diapason Découverte. Born in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, in 1990, Abduraimov began to play the piano at the age of five as a pupil of Tamara Popovich at Uspensky State Central Lyceum in Tashkent. He is an alumnus of Park University’s International Center for Music where he studied with Stanislav Ioudenitch, and now serves as the ICM’s artist-in-residence. Abduraimov’s program, titled “Love and Death,” will include: Wagner-Liszt Isolde’s Liebestod; Liszt B minor Sonata / Prokofiev Roméo and Juliet http://59productions.co.uk/project/behzod-abduraimov/ https://www.harrisonparrott.com/artists/behzod-abduraimov 4. Park ICM Masters in Concert Presents Ben Sayevich, Violin & Lolita Lisovskaya-Sayevich, Piano, Saturday, February 9, 2019, 7:30 p.m., 1900 Building, Mission Woods, Kansas Violinist Ben Sayevich has established himself as one of the most distinguished violinists and teachers of his generation. Born in Kaunas, Lithuania, he studied violin in Vilnius from the age of 6 at the Churlonis School for the Performing Arts. At 12 he immigrated to Israel with his family and studied with Felix Andrievsky. At age 21, after serving in the Israeli Army, he went to the United States to study with Dorothy DeLay, later moving to the New England Conservatory to continue studies with her (1981-85) and with Eric Rosenblith (1985-87). He is a recipient of the prestigious artist diploma from the New England Conservatory, where he was Rosenblith’s teaching assistant. Sayevich has concertized extensively throughout North America, Europe and the Far East and has appeared on radio and television as a soloist and chamber musician. He is featured as the soloist in a recording of Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons” with the Kansas City Chamber Orchestra. At the New England Conservatory he was chosen to play the Violin Concerto by Alban Berg for the celebration of the composer’s centenary. Sayevich’s interpretation carries the tradition that comes down directly from the composer, through his work on the piece with the late Louis Krasner, the commissioner, dedicatee and the violinist at the work’s premiere. His extensive activities with orchestras have included the concertmaster posts at the Kansas City Camerata and the Kansas City Chamber Orchestra, with both of which he made numerous concerto appearances, including Violin Concertos by Vieuxtemps, Glazunov, Mozart and Beethoven. He was also concertmaster of the Heidelberg Chamber Orchestra during a five-week world tour of Japan, Singapore and Canada. Sayevich also maintains a vigorous schedule as chamber musician. He is a founding member of the Park Piano Trio, established at Park University in 2006, and is violinist of the London-based Rosamunde Piano Trio. With the Rosamunde Trio he has performed widely in Europe, including appearances on BBC Radio London, Irish Public Radio in Cork and the Abbado Festival Bologna. He is also a founding member of Quartet Accorda, which began in the 1990s and was officially incorporated in 2002. Sayevich has taught at the University of Kansas, the Grieg Academy in Bergen, Norway, at the New England Conservatory, the Hartt School of Music and the Yellow Barn Music Festival, in Vermont.