Mon, May 02
|4:00 PM
Mark Travis & Alessandro Mazzamuto
Pre-concert talk

Time & Location
May 02, 2022, 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM
4:00 PM
About the Event
PROGRAM:
Liszt: Sonata
Rachmaninoff: Sonata No. 2 (First version)
BIOGRAPHIES:
Mark Travis
With more than two decades of experience, Mark Travis has just about done it all, serving as a writer, producer, broadcaster, lecturer, podcaster, voiceover artist, multi-cam director, video editor and audio engineer. Currently Director of Media Production for the New York Philharmonic, he has directed the orchestra’s broadcasts (hosted by Alec Baldwin) since 2003.
From 1999 to 2011 Mark served as a producer for Chicago’s WFMT Radio Network, where he wrote and directed more than 800 nationally syndicated programs. He also has an extensive discography as a music producer, including three Grammy-nominated recordings in five categories by the New York Philharmonic. Other credits include projects with Carnegie Hall’s Song Studio with Renée Fleming, Ensemble Connect, Handel & Haydn Society, Ensemble Companio, Living Music with Nadia Sirota—Pirate Radio Edition, the 92nd Street Y, the National Youth Orchestra, the Chicago Chorale, UMS, Interlochen Public Radio, Greenwich Choral Society, the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra. He also serves as a regular guest lecturer for Mannes College of Music at New School University and the Grand Piano Series in Naples, Florida.
Mark is a member of NARAS and serves on both the Grand Jury and Radio Advisory Board for the New York Festivals International Broadcasting Competition. He has also served as juror and Music Committee Chair for the United States Artists panel in Los Angeles.
He has been the recipient of more than 30 medals and honors for his broadcast work, including the 2015 Grand Jury Prize and five best-director awards from the New York Festivals, and he was named a special honoree for his writing in the 2017 Webby Awards.
Alessandro Mazzamuto
"Alessandro is an outstanding and marvelous musician. He is one of the most extraordinary pianists I have had the joy to hear. His technique is absolutely accomplished, extraordinary, and brilliant, and his sound production, together with his creative power, really captivated the audience. I will give him all my support and I wish him a wonderful career."
Martha Argerich (Lugano, Switzerland) September 2013
Italian pianist Alessandro Mazzamuto was born in the ancient port city of Catania, Sicily in the foothills of Mt. Etna. Music has been in his family for three generations, and his cellist parents nurtured the promising talents of all four sons for playing the violin and cello. At the age of nine, Alessandro, having started on the violin, asked if he could learn to play the piano. He began lessons with Italian pianist and conductor Epifanio Comis, and practiced at his teacher’s house. At age ten he played Mozart concerto K. 414 in a masterclass with Andras Schiff prior to his first performance with an orchestra. At that time he had enrolled in the city’s esteemed music conservatory, the Music Institute Vincenzo Bellini.
In 2011 Alessandro was a Finalist in the Busoni International Piano Competition where Martha Argerich, president of the jury, awarded him the Lodovici Prize. His 2012 recording of Rachmaninoff on the German label ARTS Music was embraced and earned superlative reviews and the Supersonic Pizzicato Award. In 2013 he was named Young Artist of the Year by the International Classical Music Association. Having captured the attention of Martha Argerich at the Busoni, he was invited to play in the Progetto Martha Argerich in Lugano, Switzerland in 2013. In an interview with French newspaper L’Express, she named him one of ten “de future grand” young pianists in the world, referring to him as “l’Italien Alessandro Mazzamuto - tres inspirant.”
In 2014 Dr. Carol Leone, an American pianist and professor at the Meadows School of Music, Southern Methodist University, in Dallas, Texas, visited the piano academy created by Alessandro’s teacher. At his suggestion, Alessandro came to study with Dr. Leone at the Meadows School and was elated to receive a generous scholarship and financial aid award. While earning his Performer’s Diploma, he won the Birte Moller Young Artist grant from the Center for Musical Excellence and debuted at Carnegie Hall in 2015. That performance received a standing ovation, and he was invited to play with the Tokyo New City Orchestra later that year. In 2017, Alessandro returned to Catania where he applied for a green card and married Chiara La Ferla, a singer, radio announcer, classical pianist and teacher, whom he first met in 2008. She moved with him to Dallas and he completed his work on an Artist Diploma from SMU in 2018.
Today Alessandro is enjoying a career of teaching, concertizing and recording. Among the orchestras, performers and conductors he has collaborated with are violinist M°Andrés Càrdenes and the Julius Quartet, Meadows Symphony - Paul Philips, conductor, La Verdi Symphony Orchestra - John Axelrod, conductor, RIAS Symphony Orchestra Berlin - Daisuke Soga, conductor, Bacau Philharmonic - Ovidiu Balan, conductor, Ploesti Philharmonic (Romania) - Ovidiu Balan, conductor, Orchestra Sinfonica Giovanile Internazionale - Orazio Baronello, conductor and more. He and his brother Lorenzo, a violinist, perform chamber works as Duo Mazzamuto, continuing a tradition from childhood.
Alessandro and Chiara recently built a home in scenic Celina, Texas, with a recital room (for his Kawai), a recording studio and a garage (for his car). With the support of Collora Piano and donors, he recently acquired his dream piano, a 2020 Fazioli concert grand. Teaching young aspiring pianists to realize their potential is his most rewarding work and he hopes to create such an opportunity at a school or music academy in the near future.