A solo recital by nationally acclaimed pianist MICHELLE CANN will close Ames Town & Gown’s  2023-24 concert season on Friday evening, April 12. The concert, at 7:30 in the Martha-Ellen Recital Hall of Iowa State University, will include works by composers Alberto Ginastera, Joel Thompson, Frédéric Chopin, Franz Liszt, and Florence Price. (See below for ticket information.) A free public lecture will take place the night before, April 11. 

A “compelling, sparkling virtuoso” (Boston Music Intelligencer) and an avid proponent of neglected Black composers, Ms. Cann was recipient of the 2022 Sphinx Medal of Excellence, the highest honor bestowed by the Sphinx Organization. She is a leading interpreter of the music of Florence Price and performed the New York City premiere of Price’s Piano Concerto in One Movement with the Dream Unfinished Orchestra in 2016, and with the Philadelphia Orchestra in 2021. Her recording with the New York Youth Symphony won the 2023 Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance.  She also received the Cleveland Institute of Music’s 2022 Alumni Achievement Award and the 2022 Andrew Wolf Chamber Music Award.  Ms. Cann was very recently heard in an exciting performance of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue with the Des Moines Symphony Orchestra.  

Ms. Cann joined the Curtis Institute’s piano faculty in 2020 as the inaugural Eleanor Sokoloff Chair in Piano Studies and joined the faculty of the Manhattan School of Music in 2023. She holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where she studied with Paul Schenly and Daniel Shapiro, and an Artist’s Diploma from Curtis as a student of Robert McDonald. 

In addition to her Friday evening concert, Ms. Cann will present a public lecture titled “Musical Legacies of Phenomenal Women of Color” on Thursday evening, April 11 at 7:00 p.m. in ISU’s Martha-Ellen Tye Recital Hall. This event, co-sponsored by Iowa State Lectures, is free to the public. (Cont. )

Ames Town & Gown Chamber Music Association 's 74^th concert season is presented in cooperation with the Department of Music and Theatre at Iowa State University and is made possible in part with support from the Ames Commission on the Arts (COTA).  [ Continued]

April 12 CONCERT TICKETS: $35, available online at www.amestownandgown.org; at Rieman Music (Ames), Chocolaterie Stam (Ames), and at the door. STUDENT TICKETS FREE K-12 and college/university with student ID

April 11 LECTURE: Open and free to the public. 

 ALL SEATING IS GENERAL ADMISSION

INFORMATION: www.amestownandgown.org 

or contact Artistic Director Paula Forrest (515)451-0911; town.gown@gmail.com