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27 June 2011
Chinese-born pianist Jian Liu has had a busy weekend preparing for Tuesday night’s Palmerston North concert with flutist Alexa Still and violinist Martin Riseley.
Jian, who now lives in Wellington, was only asked last Friday to join the Chamber Music New Zealand tour with Alexa and Martin in place of acclaimed New Zealand pianist Diedre Irons after she suffered a fall and injured her hand.
The tour has its first performance on Tuesday night at the Regent on Broadway in Palmerston North, before the trio heads to New Plymouth, Nelson and Invercargill.
The concert features a programme including works from Beethoven, Bach, Prokofiev, Ravel and well-known film composer Nino Rota.
Jian Liu has performed on concert stages in Europe, Asia and the United States and was recently appointed to the New Zealand School of Music as Assistant Professor of Piano.
Alexa Still is the former principal flute of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and is based at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music where she is Head of Flute Studies. She performs recitals and concertos around the world.
Recently returned to New Zealand, audiences will remember Martin Riseley as the winner of the TVNZ Young Musicians Competition in 1988. Martin has been artist-in-residence at the University of Alberta in Canada where he was Concertmaster of Canada's Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. In 2009, Martin took up the position of Head of Strings at the New Zealand School of Music.
The trio perform a stunning programme including Beethoven's Sonata for Piano and Violin in D Opus 12 No 1, alongside Bach’s Trio Sonata and Ravel’s virtuosic and gypsy-influenced Tzigane. Prokofiev's bright and lyrical flute sonata and a trio by one of the 20th century's best-known film composers, Nino Rota, who composed the scores for The Godfather and Franco Zeferelli's Romeo and Juliet.
Alexa Still, Martin Risely and Jian Liu perform in Palmerston North, New Plymouth, Nelson and Invercargill from 28 June to 2 July.