Marie Alatalo: Bernstein Touches, Ligeti etudes, Torke Blue Pacific, Crumb Makrokosmos I

This event will be available both live and in person. If you purchase a ticket a link to the livestream will be sent ahead of the concert to the email used to purchase the ticket.

Dr. Marie Alatalo has appeared in concerts throughout the United States and Japan, capturing attention with a repertoire embracing both classical and contemporary literature. She has been heard in Chicago at such popular venues as WFMT radio, Mayne Stage, Music Institute of Chicago, Chopin Theater, Pick-Staiger, Pianoforte, and more. Her interest in contemporary music has gleaned performances of works by Bolcom, Rzewski, and others, and includes Chicago premieres of Lee Hoiby’s piano quartet “Dark Rosaleen” and George Crumb’s “Sun and Shadow” with singer Barbara Martin. Her performance of George Crumb’s Makrokosmos, Book 1 at the Music Institute brought critical acclaim, describing Alatalo as having “a special sort of pianistic, and extra-pianistic, virtuosity”

Her recordings, available on Spotify, Pandora and itunes, include “Sonatas”, featuring the genre from Scarlatti through Prokofiev, the complete Chopin Preludes, funded by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, and a third project with pieces by American composers. She can be heard on the SONY release, “Live in Osaka”, with the Eastman Wind Ensemble, playing Joseph Schwantner’s “… and the mountains rising nowhere”

She has guest lectured at the Chautauqua Institution, on board the “River Countess” which sails from Budapest to Amsterdam and presented lecture recitals for both regional and state divisions of MTNA. She has written for and been the subject of articles published by “Clavier” magazine.

Alatalo’s distinguished teaching career was recently recognized by the Royal Conservatory of Music with a Teacher of Distinction award. She is a member of the Conservatory’s College of Examiners and is named by the Conservatory as a Founding Teacher in the US. She is a former faculty member of the Interlochen Center for the Arts and currently is on the Artist Faculty of the Music Institute of Chicago.

Alatalo was raised in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, graduated from the Interlochen Arts Academy and the University of Michigan, and earned the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the Eastman School of Music, where she was Teaching Assistant to Rebecca Penneys.

Photo Credit: © Todd Rosenberg Photography