Pianist Rust to present versatile program at SFA

NACOGDOCHES, Texas – Dr. Roberta Rust, professor and head of the piano department at the Lynn University Conservatory in Boca Raton, Florida, will present a guest recital at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 23, in Cole Concert Hall on the campus of Stephen F. Austin State University.

The program includes “a wide and interesting variety of piano music,” said Dr. Andrew Parr, professor of piano in the SFA School of Music, ranging from a familiar W.A. Mozart sonata and Claude Debussy’s “Clair de Lune,” to Brazilian tangos, to recently composed works by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, Phillip Evans, Michael Anderson and Almeida Prado.

“There is something here for everyone,” Parr said.

In May 2019, Rust’s new CD, “Direct Contact,” was released on Navona Records and has garnered enthusiastic reviews. The American Record Guide praised the recording as follows: “Rust is a virtuoso of the highest order and the best possible advocate for this music. She has masterly control of tone ... her technical control in difficult passage work is clean, the direction of each phrase clear and always musical. This is a memorable program.”

Rust has concertized to critical acclaim around the globe, with performances at such venues as Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall, New York's Merkin Concert Hall, Rio de Janeiro's Sala Cecilia Meireles, Washington's Corcoran Gallery, Havana’s Basilica and Seoul's KNUA Hall. The 2019-20 season includes solo recitals in Texas, Alabama, Georgia, Oregon, Washington, Iowa, Arizona, Florida, Singapore and the Philippines. Her concerto appearances have included engagements with the Houston Symphony, Philippine Philharmonic, New Philharmonic, Redlands Symphony, Boca Raton Symphonia, Knox-Galesburg Symphony, New World Symphony, and orchestras in Latin America. For more information, visit www.robertarust.com.

Her performance at SFA is a feature of the Friends of Music Concert Series. Tickets are $8 for adults, $6 for seniors and $3 for students and youth. For tickets or more information, call the SFA Fine Arts Box Office at (936) 468-6407 or visit www.finearts.sfasu.edu.