Student Award Benefit Concert

Five years ago, thanks to a bequest from the Estate of Donald and Mildred Drew, the DGMC donated a new Feurich Concert I grand piano to the Downers Grove Public Library. DGMC dedicated the new piano with a concert intended to show off the new instrument, and the first piece on that program was Debussy’s "Clair de lune," performed by Chris Garofalo. What a fitting way to kick off our our webconcert series!

Back in high school, Gabby won 1st place in the Junior Competition of the DGMC Piano Festival & Competition, and subsequently she received a Rising Stars Award from DGMC. Last spring, she graduated from DePaul University with a BFA in Film and Television, and she has been doing a great deal of composing, performing and creating music. She has shared this video from a concert in December of 2019.

In August of this year, Louise released Two Gardens, a CD of original compositions celebrating the two paths of growth for parents and their children. Louise has shared a video recording from her album release show. We will also be sharing another song from Two Gardens later in the DGMC concert series.

Chicago saxophonist, composer, and music educator Dan Moroz has a new composition that is a bit on the eerie side – perfect for Halloween. Dan notes he premiered this piece five days before we all went under lockdown due to COVID-19, and it evokes the unsettled feelings we all experienced during the early days of the pandemic.

This performance showcases the talented Spirito! Ragazze (5th-8th grade girls) and Bravura (9th-12th grade young women) ensembles from the western Chicagoland area. It’s hard to assemble such a large group for one of our in-person concerts, but now we can share this clip from a Comcast recording of a concert that was shown on an Elmhurst local access station.

It’s so good to hear from our former DGMC member who moved to Kentucky 4 years ago. Sarah is playing for Ballardsville Baptist Church and also taking on a few students after a 5 year break from teaching. She’s kept her studio small to homeschool her oldest, Wesley, who she also teaches piano. Here, Sarah performs two popular Chopin pieces, Polonaise in C sharp minor and Nocturne in B major.

What a treat to hear violinist Amelia Korbitz, who won both a Rising Star and College Music Award, as she plays two selections – Ferdinando Carulli's Duo No. 2 with her father, Ron Korbitz, and Alan Hovhaness' "Hercules" with her mother, Angela Presutti Korbitz. These selections were recorded as part of a benefit concert by the Korbitz family to aid musicians who lost substantial work due to Covid-19.

This performance features a pair of short piano pieces by contemporary Japanese composers. The first piece, “Ondo no Funauta” written in 1964 by Hajime Okumura, has the form of a traditional Japanese folk melody. By contrast, the second piece, “To a Disappeared Pleiad” (1997), was written by Takashi Yoshimatsu who composes in the Western classical style.