Wilton Candlelight Concerts music group to present pianist

The Wilton Candlelight Concerts music group will be presenting pianist Marc-Andre Hamelin on Sunday, March 20 at 4 p.m. at the Wilton Congregational Church. The group will open its 74th season with Hamelin in a program of music by famed composers Bach, Prokofiev, Scriabin and Beethoven. More information is available by emailing Cortina Learning International language school in Wilton’s President and Project Editor Magdalen Livesey at m.livesey@cortinalearning.com. The current concert season is dedicated to the memory of Wilton resident Margaret Porter Gregory. Hamelin is “renowned for his fresh readings of the established repertoire and his intrepid exploration of lesser known music works of the 19th, and the 20th centuries,” the group said of the pianist in a release. “He is admired for his brilliant technique and his questing, deep thinking approach to everything that he plays.” In recent seasons, Hamelin has appeared as a recitalist or an orchestral guest soloist in such cities as New York, Chicago, Detroit, Boston, Portland and in Quebec, Canada. He has also appeared internationally in Antwerp, Berlin, London, Melbourne, Rotterdam and Milan, among many other cities. A prolific recording artist, Hamelin has set to disk some 50 Compact Discs for the Hyperion record label. The CDs range from the music works of composers Alkan, Ives, Medtner and Roslavets to performances of composers Haydn, Mozart, Schumann, Brahms and Chopin. In 2010, Hamelin joined the ranks on CD of noted composer-pianists by releasing his own inventive, 12 Etudes, songs in all of the minor keys on the Hyperion label and with publication by the Edition Peters music publishing company. Winner of the 1985 Carnegie Hall Competition, Hamelin was born in Montreal. He began to play the piano at the age of five and, by the age of nine, had already won top prize in the Canadian Music Competition. His father, a pharmacist by trade and a keen pianist, had introduced him to the music works of composers Alkan, Medtner and Sorabji when he was still very young. Hamelin is featured in the book, “The Composer-Pianists: Hamelin and the Eight,” by author Robert Rimm and previously published by the Amadeus Press publishing company. The concert will take place at 4 p.m. at the Wilton Congregational Church. The church is located just north of Wilton Center on Route 33 in the town. Tickets may be obtained at the door for $30. Senior citizens are $25. Students are free.

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