![\"Christina](\"https:\/\/yfile.news.yorku.ca\/files\/2013\/04\/Christina-Petrowska-Quilico-storyimage.jpg\")
York University music Professor Christina Petrowska Quilico, a renowned pianist and champion of contemporary and Canadian music, headlines York\u2019s Faculty Concert Series on Thursday, Nov. 14<\/b> at 7:30pm. She will present a program of solo piano works by rising Canadian composer Constantine Caravassilis and one of Canada's first prominent female composers\u00a0Ann Southam (1937-2010).<\/p>\n
Christina Petrowska Quilico<\/strong><\/p>\n Petrowska Quilico\u2019s selections for the concert include three compositions from Caravassilis\u2019s\u00a0Visions: The Complete Books of Rhapsodies and Fantasias<\/i>. Earlier this year Petrowska Quilico premiered the suite of works at the CBC\u2019s Glenn Gould Studio and recorded the compositions on the Centrediscs label with the support of the inaugural Harry Freedman Award, which she received jointly with the composer.<\/p>\n The title Visions<\/i> took inspiration from Caravassilis\u2019s syn-aesthetic \u201cvisions\u201d, connecting colours to sound. In response, while in the process of recording, Petrowska Quilico created more than 100 paintings to accompany the music.<\/p>\n Her recording and subsequent performances of Visions<\/i> have met with rave reviews. The Wholenote<\/i> lauded her playing as \"immensely delicate but also very forceful, while never betraying any sense of effort.\"<\/p>\n Her Nov. 14 recital will also feature a selection of new interpretations of Glass Houses<\/i>, a spellbinding suite of piano pieces composed by Southam in 1981. Petrowska Quilico, who collaborated musically with Southam for nearly three decades, continued to develop the original series with the late composer\u2019s blessing. She released a recording of Glass Houses Revisited<\/i> in 2011 and is now preparing the 2009 version of the cycle, as revised by Southam, for release in 2014. She will premiere excerpts from this new collection in the concert.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Glass Houses<\/em> are fiendishly difficult etudes,\u201d said Petrowska Quilico. \u201cFingers become whirling dervishes entering a mystical and ecstatic trance through suddenly shifting patterns and moods. The dizzying tempi, speed and control required from the performer make them extremely demanding, requiring virtuosic pianistic skills.\u201d<\/p>\n Petrowska\u2019s performances and recordings of Southam\u2019s Glass Houses<\/i> have earned high critical praise. The Toronto Star<\/i> hailed Glass Houses Revisited<\/i> as \u201cnothing short of miraculous \u2026 Christina Petrowska Quilico elevates to poetry the complex musical loops created by Ann Southam ... That [she] can perform these \u2026 pieces is an achievement in itself; that it makes for mesmerizing listening is the magic of art.\"<\/p>\n Petrowska Quilico has been a professor of piano performance and musicology at York since 1987. In a professional performance career spanning five decades and four continents, she has appeared on some of the world\u2019s most prestigious concert stages. She has premiered more than 100 works, including 16 piano concerti, and has recorded some 30 CDs featuring concerti, solo and chamber works by contemporary Canadian and international composers as well as standard classical repertoire. Four of her recordings of Canadian music have earned Juno nominations. She was honoured with the 2007 Friends of Canadian Music Award from the Canadian Music Centre and Canadian League of Composers.<\/p>\n Petrowska Quilico\u2019s recital is the second of four performances in the 2013-14 Faculty Concert Series spotlighting faculty artists in the Department of Music at York University. Upcoming concerts will feature jazz artists Ron Westray (trombone) on Jan. 16, 2014, and Sundar Viswanathan (saxophone, flute) on Feb. 27, 2014.<\/p>\n