Mississippi University for Women music professor Dr. Julia Mortyakova and Dr. Valentin Bogdan will perform a duo recital in Poindexter Hall on Friday, April 25, at 7:30 p.m. Fittingly titled “Touring The World,” the free concert features a mixture of piano duet music from various eras and geographical regions. Timeless masterpieces such as the “Fantasy in F Minor” by German composer Franz Schubert, or “Pieces Romantiques” by the French composer Cecile Chaminade, are on the program, as well as two new works written for the two piano medium by U.S.-based composers Olga Harris and Bogdan. The program also features the Columbus premiere of Bogdan’s piano four-hands arrangements of Argentinean tangos, which have been hailed by critics across the country as “charming” and “outstanding.”
About the pianists
Mortyakova currently teaches and serves as chair of the MUW Department of Music. Originally from Moscow, she has given solo piano recitals, appeared as a soloist with orchestras and performed in music festivals across the country and abroad including the Aspen Music Festival, Eastern Music Festival, Natchez Festival of Music, South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts, Musica Nueva Malaga (Spain), Assisi Music Festival (Italy), Zhytomyr’s Musical Spring (Ukraine), and Symphonic Workshops International Piano Masterclass (Bulgaria). She is the 2012 winner of the Sigma Alpha Iota Career Performance Grant.
She is a published author in the U.S. and Ukraine, and her first independent solo piano album has sold internationally.
Mortyakova is a graduate of Interlochen Arts Academy, Vanderbilt University, New York University, and the University of Miami. Learn more at juliamortyakova.com.
Bogdan serves as assistant professor of music at MUW. A native of Romania, he toured as a teenager with the Tudor Ciortea Music School Orchestra of Brasov throughout Europe and Asia in countries like Netherlands, Great Britain, France and Jordan. An award-winning pianist and composer, he has performed solo and chamber music recitals in North America and Europe.
Among others, he was a soloist with the Varna Symphony (Bulgaria) and Wayne State Symphony (Michigan). His music was performed at Festival Miami, Music at MOCA Concert Series, the Oregon Bach Festival, the St. Joseph Catholic Church Concert Series in New York, and New Music concerts in Arizona, Arkansas, California, Florida, Louisiana, Michigan, New Mexico and numerous other states. He was the 2010 Florida State Music Teachers Association commissioned composer of the year.
Bogdan is a graduate of University of Miami, Michigan State University and Wayne State University with degrees in piano performance and music composition.
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