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Baron Fenwick Piano Recital on May 28 at ASU’s Rosen Concert Hall

Fenwick
Fenwick

Baron Fenwick will be performing a piano recital at the Rosen Concert Hall on the Appalachian State University campus on Thursday evening, May 28, at 7:00pm.

The recital is free and open to the public. Area residents will remember Baron as a Green Valley School youngster playing piano and violin at the annual Watauga Education Foundation Shooting Stars talent showcase.

Baron is now a 21-year-old piano performance major at Mannes College The New School of Music in New York City studying with renowned Russian-American pianist Vladimir Feltsman.

Baron began playing the piano at age 4, taking lessons locally from Mrs. Lisa Brown and developing a love for all things musical. At age 9, he began studying with Dr. Bair Shagdaron at Appalachian State University. While in elementary school he also studied violin with Mrs. Laura Coston, viola with Dr. Eric Koontz, and horn with Dr. Karen Robertson.

After graduating from Green Valley, Baron attended the NC School of the Arts in Winston-Salem for two years studying piano with Dr. Clifton Matthews and viola with Ms. Sheila Browne. He then home schooled for two years while studying piano with American pianist Susan Starr. Baron has just finished his third year at Mannes College in NYC and is home in Todd briefly before heading off to the Sarasota Music Festival during June.

Baron is the oldest son of Jay Fenwick and Cindy Norris.

Baron recently won first prize in the 2015 William C. Byrd Young Artist Competition and received honorable mention in the 2013 Mannes concerto competition, and has won numerous state and national competitions.

He received first prize in the 2011 Jacob Flier International Piano Competition in New Paltz, New York, top pianist at the 2011 Blount-Slawson Concerto Competition in Montgomery, Ala., and first prize at the 2010 Lee University Piano Competition in Tennessee. Statewide awards include first prizes in the 2009 NC Symphony Concerto Competition Junior Division and in the 2010 Charlotte Symphony Youth Artist Competition.

Baron was the first recipient of UNCSA’s Leonard Bernstein Award of Excellence (awarded by Chancellor John Mauceri) in 2009.

Baron has accumulated a number of important concert appearances. In April 2016 he will perform Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1 with the Flint Symphony Orchesta. In January, he performed the Liszt Sonata at the Hungarian Consulate in New York City.

In December 2014, he performed alongside Mr. Feltsman in a concert honoring the composer Alfred Schnittke. Baron played the $1.2 million Kuhn-Bosendorfer piano at its unveiling in the Winston-Salem art studio of John Kuhn. In New York, Baron has performed at the Ukrainian Institute, Bohemian National Hall, and other venues. He has performed at the North Carolina Governor’s Mansion.

In the last several years he has performed solo recitals in Bedford, Virginia; Sun City, South Carolina; Ocala, Florida; New Paltz, New York; Leonardtown, Maryland; Westport, New York; and New York, New York; as well as multiple appearances in Boone, North Carolina and Chatham, Massachusetts.

Baron has participated in summer festivals worldwide, including the Sarasota Music Festival, Meadowmount School of Music, PianoSummer at New Paltz, Tibor Varga Music Academy in Switzerland, California Summer Music, and the Southeastern Piano Festival. He has played in masterclasses for pianists including John Perry, Robert Levin, Awadagin Pratt, Peter Takacs, Alexander Korsantia, Lev Natochenny, and many others.

He is also an avid chamber musician whose coaches have included Pamela Frank, Robert Levin, Kim Kashkashian, Charles Neidich, John Perry, Robert Vernon, Todd Phillips, Frank Morelli, Cho-Liang Lin, Barbara Stein Mallow, Csaba Onczay, Geraldo Ribeiro, Audrey Axinn, Sheila Browne, Steven Doane, Ju-Ying Song, Hans Jorgen Jensen, Diane Walsh, William Purvis, and Gena Raps.
Baron’s musical interests are unusually diverse. At Mannes, he has studied historically-minded performance of Baroque and Classical music, and is equally at home on the harpsichord or fortepiano as he is on modern instruments. He has performed in the Mannes Baroque ensemble and has performed sonatas of Mozart and Beethoven on a model of a late-18th century fortepiano.

He is also active in the contemporary music scene, premiering works by Mannes student composers and attending many concerts of new music. On his own time, he is an amateur composer and improviser. Above all, Baron enjoys collaborating with other musicians and has learned and performed a significant repertoire of chamber music.