America/Beautiful

America/Beautiful

Featuring Min Kwon, Pianist

Sunday, November 8, 3 PM (Doors 2 PM)

Tickets $45

America/Beautiful is a project by pianist and arts advocate Min Kwon, in which she has commissioned 76 of today’s leading composers to each compose a variation on “America the Beautiful”. Kwon’s hope is to paint a sonic picture of her adopted country in all of its sprawling complexity, and ultimately try to find the beauty at the core of the American experiment and its credo of e pluribus unum (out of many, one).

“Min Kwon’s America/Beautiful is a visionary project that speaks to the power of music to bring people together across differences. The project’s scale, imagination, and urgency are deeply human and profoundly of our time.”
– Michelle Witt, Executive & Artistic Director, Meany Center for the Arts

Excerpts from Artist’s Statement: Why Then and Why Now

The project has completely captured me. It is now an all-consuming labor of love. Its mission:

• To celebrate the cultural melting pot that is our country
• To unite as many voices as possible for one purpose, one project, one question: What is America? Is it beautiful, was it ever, or will it ever be?
• To better listen and to better understand the voices of others.

Why then, when many feel that America is not beautiful, do I keep persisting on this project? Because, despite its ever sprawling complexity, I believe America is beautiful. It is the country my parents chose to come, to give my sister and me a better education so we could make music that has meaning, share music that matters.

I believe in the transformative power of music. When you listen to this thought-provoking, soul-stirring, culturally rich, and staggeringly varied collection of new music, you will agree, too. All seventy-six composers who contributed to the project reflected thoughtfully on our country. They entrusted me to speak through their voices, a responsibility I don’t take lightly. It moves me deeply. So I keep at it. I believe I can reach more people and invite them to join the call for action—whether by being in the audience or by sharing the platform.

Does “America The Beautiful” only exist in its lyrics? Can each of these new variations help to open your ears, spark curiosity, and foster shared hope? I believe that all Americans can work to make America beautiful. It may take my entire lifetime—and then some—but I want to try, with My America/Beautiful.

MEET THE ARTIST

Min Kwon

Korean-born American pianist Min Kwon excels in a versatile career that encompasses concerti, solo recitals, and chamber music appearances, while in high demand around the world as pedagogue, arts advocate, and administrator. She has held professional engagements in over 60 countries on seven continents and all 50 U.S. states.

Professor of Piano at Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University since 2002, Dr. Kwon is also the founder and director of the Center for Musical Excellence (CME), a non-profit dedicated to mentoring and supporting gifted young musicians. To date, CME has awarded 12 international performing arts grants, each up to $10,000, and currently features 20 young artists on the 2019 CME Young Artists Roster. CME’s alumni/ae list includes more than 100 young artists from 22 countries. As Artistic Director of Music Made Here, a concert series inaugurated in 2018, and CME in Harding Homes, Kwon brings world class talent to intimate venues. She has also served as Co-Director of Vienna ConcertoFest, a two-week festival that provides extraordinary opportunities for young artists to appear as soloists with the Viennese International Orchestra in prestigious venues in Austria.

As soloist, Min Kwon has performed extensively in Europe, North and South America, and Asia, with such orchestras as Philadelphia, North Carolina, Atlanta, New Jersey, and Fort Worth, Aspen Festival Orchestra, Orquesta Estaudo Mexico, Orquesta Sinfónica Venezuela, Wiener Residenz Orchester, Bacau Philharmonic, as well as all major orchestras in Korea on several nationally televised concerts. Since her Avery Fisher (now David Geffen) Hall, Lincoln Center debut in 1992 with the Juilliard Orchestra, she has appeared with many of New York’s leading ensembles, including New York Classical Players, Manhattan Chamber Orchestra, and the New York Sinfonietta. Among the distinguished conductors with whom she has collaborated are James Conlon, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, Alan Gilbert, Vaktang Jordania, Gerhardt Zimmerman, and Xian Zhang.

Min Kwon holds Doctor of Musical Arts and Master of Music degrees from The Juilliard School and a Bachelor of Music degree from The Curtis Institute of Music, completing post-doctoral studies in Salzburg. From 2015-2018, she served on the Juilliard Council as the first and only alumnus/a to be invited. She counts among her teachers and mentors Eleanor Sokoloff, Martin Canin, Leon Fleisher, Hans Leygraf, Dorothy DeLay, Jerome Lowenthal, and Leif Ove Andsnes. Kwon is a Steinway Artist.