Campbellsville University’s School of Music will be hosting pianist Nada again in a guest piano recital Thursday, Jan. 19 at 8 p.m. in The Gheens Recital Hall, 210 University Drive, Campbellsville, Ky.
Nada’s program will include works by Robert Schumann, Naji Hakim and Franz Liszt. The public is invited to the concert which is free. Nada will also give piano students a masterclass Friday, Jan. 20 from 10 a.m. until noon.
A United States citizen of Lebanese/Hungarian descent, with a French education, pianist Nada is a native of Beirut, Lebanon.
Her piano training was hampered by the unrelenting civil war and terrorism which also cost her mother’s life in a mortar explosion in her own home in Beirut. Her family escaped to the mountains where Nada was mainly self-taught with a few books of music – the Bach Inventions and the Chopin Waltzes and Polonaises.
After only seven years of playing the piano, she was admitted to the Paris Conservatory, France, where she became the first woman from the Middle East to take First Prize.
Since then, she has created a career with tremendous depth and breadth. Her insightful readings and unique approach to the major music repertoire frequently remind audiences and critics of the legendary pianists Gina Bachauer and Clara Haskil. And more recently, she has been described as “a music personality of this century, such as a Glenn Gould or Samson François.”
About her work as a pioneer, her mentor, the late master George Sebok wrote: “a hero of the arts.” She traveled with a piano on a truck, introducing classical music to rural communities, hospital patients and prison populations.
Nada also works with several local organizations, including her own non-profit, Sundays Love Music, which is committed to broadening the audience of classical music while bringing excitement for classical composers and how they have influenced us in so many ways. She also had years of radio experience starting with WUOL and creating her own show, The Classical Hour, on WCHQ.
Pianist Nada teaches privately and at Indiana University Southeast in the Arts Institute department. In May 2023, she anticipates participating in the inaugural concert of a new Brahms Society presented by the Ogle Center at IUS and Sundays Love Music.
She has recorded all of Brahms’ piano solos, including her own arrangements of the Choral-Preludes for organ, Op. 122 and a first-time recording of Brahms Symphony No. 1, in a reduction for piano solo, digitally released in May 2022.
All recordings can be found on her website at https://pianistnada.com/shop/ and on Amazon and other digital platforms.
Campbellsville University is a widely acclaimed Kentucky-based Christian university that offers over 100 programs of study including doctoral, master, bachelor, associate and certificate programs. The website for complete information is www.campbellsville.edu.