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Historical Piano Concerts Series
About the Musicians

Sarah Grunstein

Australian pianist Sarah Grunstein performs internationally as concert artist. Her career has included concerts in the United States, Austria, Hungary, Italy, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and her homeland. A winner of the Queen Elizabeth II Silver Jubilee Award for Young Australians, she has appeared as concerto soloist with the Monteverdi Chamber Orchestra, the Melbourne Musicians, the Victorian State Orchestra, and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. During the celebration of the Bach Tercentenary she performed Bach’s complete Well-Tempered Clavier in London, New York, and Sydney, her Bach recital in London leading to an invitation to perform at Kensington Palace before the Prince of Wales.

She has given master-classes, lecture-recitals, and seminars on modern and historic instruments in the United States (including the New England Conservatory and the Frederick Historical Piano Collection), Norway, England, New Zealand, and Australia. As performer and educator she is particularly interested in historical performance interpretation and the improvisatory aspects of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century music.

A graduate of The Juilliard School, where she earned the Bachelor and Master of Music degrees and held a Teaching Fellowship for four years following graduation, she received the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from The Graduate Center of the City University of New York.  In 2002 Sarah Grunstein joined the faculty of the College of the Holy Cross where she is Assistant Professor, and is Co-Director of the Chamber Music Program. She has created and directed festivals at the Frederick Historical Piano Collection featuring Holy Cross students performing solo and chamber works on historic instruments. She has recently been elected as the first Board Member in Performance for the Northeast Region of the College Music Society.

In the summer of 2008 Sarah Grunstein performed Bach’s Goldberg Variations in Italy at the XIV International Music Festival at Rocca Grimalda, Alessandria, organized by the Comune of Rocca and the Regione Piemonte. In the United Kingdom, at Durham University she presented a lecture-recital entitled “Playing the Changing Face of Chopin’s Score.” Her performance-demonstration included her own improvisation between preludes. She presented master-classes at Monash University, Melbourne, Australia, and for the Piano Forum at the Norwegian Academy of Music, Oslo. In New Zealand, she presented piano classes, master-classes, and recital as Distinguished Artist-in-Residence at the University of Auckland.

This is her third appearance on our series.

Ms. Grunstein is a Steinway Concert Artist.

For more information please visit http://www.sarahgrunstein.com/ .