Marshall Cuffe

Tag: Marshall Cuffe

LU Student Musicians Featured in Sunday WPR Broadcast

Three Lawrence University student musicians — pianists Marshall Cuffe and David Keep and saxophonist Sumner Truax — will be featured performers April 11 at 12:30 p.m. in the annual Neale-Silva Young Artist’s Winners’ Recital.

The recital, performed in the Wisconsin Union Theater in Madison, will be broadcast live statewide on the Classical Music Network of Wisconsin Public Radio and can be heard locally on WPNE, 89.3 FM.

Cuffe, Keep and Truax were named three of the five winners at the 2010 Neale-Silva Young Artist’s Competition conducted last month.

For Sunday’s recital, Cuffe will perform Bach’s “Chromatic Fantasy in D minor” and “Fantasy on Themes from ‘The Wizard of Oz’” by William Hirtz. Keep will play three movements from Alberto Ginastera’s “Sonata No. 1.” Truax will perform “Buku” by Jacob Ter Veldhuis and “Tableaux de ProvenceI” by Paule Maurice.

Pianists, Saxophonist Share Top Honors in State Music Competition

Lawrence University student musicians accounted for three of the five winners at the 15th annual Neale-Silva Young Artists competition held March 27 in Madison.

Pianists Marshall Cuffe and David Keep and saxophonist Sumner Truax shared top honors with trumpet player Ansel Norris, a senior at Madison East High School and clarinetist Matthew Griffith, a senior at Sheboygan North High School, in the state competition sponsored by Wisconsin Public Radio.   Each received $400 for their winning performances.

This was the fifth straight year and 10th time in the past 12 years that Lawrence students have won or shared top honors in the Neale-Silva event.

The competition is open to instrumentalists and vocal performers 17-26 years of age who are either from Wisconsin or attend a Wisconsin college.  Lawrence musicians accounted for seven of the competition’s 13 finalists, who were selected from 15 entrants. In addition to the three winners, also advancing to the finals were pianists Laura Hauer, Dario LaPoma and Karly Stern, and oboist Cayden Milton.

Cuff, Keep and Truax will reprise their winning performances Sunday, April 11 at 12:30 p.m. in the Wisconsin Union Theater in Madison.  The concert will be broadcast live statewide on the Classical Music Network of WPR and can be heard locally at 89.3 FM.

For the April 11 concert, Cuffe, a sophomore from Salem, Ore., will perform Bach’s Chromatic Fantasy” and “Fantasy on Themes from Wizard of Oz” by William Hirtz while Keep, a junior from Traverse City, Mich., will play three movements from Alberto Ginastera’s“Sonata No. 1.” Both are students in the studio of Anthony Padilla.

Truax, a junior from Chicago, Ill., will perform “Buku”by Jacob Ter Veldhuis and “Tableaux De Provence I, II & III”by Paule Maurice.  He studies with Steven Jordheim and Sara Kind, a 2004 and 2006 Neale-Silva Young Artist winner herself.

The Neale-Silva Young Artists’ Competition was established to recognize young Wisconsin performers of classical music who demonstrate an exceptionally high level of artistry.  It is supported by a grant from the estate of the late University of Wisconsin Madison professor Eduardo Neale-Silva, a classical music enthusiast who was born in Talca, Chile and came to the United States in 1925.

Lawrence University Student Pianist Shines in Seattle Music Competition

APPLETON, WIS. — Marshall Cuffe, a Lawrence University sophomore from Salem, Ore., was awarded the Mendelssohn and Audience Favorite prizes following his performance Oct. 10 in the final round of the collegiate division of the 2009 Seattle International Piano Festival and Competition.

Marshall-Cuffe_web.jpgCuffe, who studies in the piano study of Associate Professor of Music Anthony Padilla, was one of six finalists who advanced to the finals from a pool of applicants from Canada, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Italy, Korea, the United Kingdom and the United States. He performed works by Felix Mendelssohn and Olivier Messiaen.

The annual competition is held in conjunction with a piano festival that features guest recitals, lectures and master classes. Designed to encourage pianists to find their own niche, participants have the freedom to choose their competition repertoire without specific requirements.

The Mendelssohn and Audience Favorite awards were just the latest accolades for Cuffe, a double-degree candidate majoring in piano performance and Psychology. Last spring he earned first-prize honors in the 2009 Wisconsin Music Teachers Association Collegiate Piano Competition and performed as a “Rising Star” in the 2008 American Guild of Organists National Convention in Minneapolis.