Pianist and Cal Poly music Professor Emeritus W. Terrence Spiller will present a recital featuring innovative works by three great keyboard composers: Johann Sebastian Bach, Béla Bartók and Frédéric Chopin.
The program will open with Bach’s buoyant “Italian Concerto,” BWV 971 in F Major, which demonstrates his mastery of the Italian “concerto grosso” style for orchestra. Bartók’s groundbreaking “14 Bagatelles” will follow in which the composer displays his new musical language through character pieces.
Chopin’s “Four Ballades” will be featured on the second half. The monumental Romantic works combine his lyricism with dramatic virtuosity to tell “unidentified” stories.
“All three composers combine their compositional brilliance with great inspiration and insight,” said Spiller. “Bach’s solo keyboard piece that successfully ‘imitates’ an Italian orchestral form; Bartók infuses short, traditional character pieces with his new approaches to harmony, melody and rhythm; and Chopin tells expansive stories in new and distinctive forms across the vast range of piano writing that he developed.”
Spiller retired from teaching at Cal Poly in spring 2023. He was a member of the Music Department faculty from 1991-2023, and served as its chair from 2004-19.
