“Anyone who has a set of ears and an open soul and heart will be able to enjoy the evening” – Barbara Nissman
Pianist Barbara Nissman loves the great romantic piano music of the Nineteenth Century, but she also champions twentieth-century composers including Béla Bartók, Sergei Prokofiev, and Alberto Ginastera.
Nissman’s relationship with Ginastera’s music is special: she studied with the composer at University of Michigan, and he wrote his final piece of piano music for her. She was then discovered by Eugene Ormandy in Philadelphia, which helped launch her career as a pianist. For twenty years, she has lived in Lewisburg, West Virginia, while still traveling around the world to perform and teach masterclasses.
This weekend, Nissman will be performing a benefit concert for Carnegie Hall and the Greenbrier Valley Theatre. The concert is at Carnegie Hall Lewisburg, Saturday April 25 at 7:30pm.
We have many of Nissman’s recordings – of Prokofiev, Liszt, Schumann, Brahms, Bartók, Ginastera, Chopin, and Beethoven – in our library. Having heard her recordings and played them on the radio, I was especially happy to get to talk to her about music.
Interview with Barbara Nissman