Collaborative piano

PERFORMANCE BIOGRAPHY
GREG SMITH
Certifications and degrees:
– 1996: Associate of Music, Australia (A. mus. A.) in piano performance
– 1998: Licentiate of Music, Australia (L. mus. A.) in piano performance
– 2001: Bachelor of Music, with honours, class I (University Medal).  University of Newcastle.  Double major in piano and composition.
– 2003: Master of Creative Arts, University of Music.  Performance practice issues in Russian piano music.

Experience:

  • Performances as soliost and accompanist in Australia, Japan, Malaysia, and New Zealand.
  • Performed improvised and original scores for Australia’s Silent Film Festival.  Films include Nosferatu, The Lodger, The General, Tol’rable David, and shorts by Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keating.
  • Collaborative pianist with artists ranging from beginners through to post-graduate university students and professional performers.  Worked with most instruments and familiar with a large portion of the repertoire.  Particular interest in the late romantic repertoire (such as Rachmaninoff’s cello sonata, Arensky’s piano trio, and the Brahms sonatas).  Collaborated with artists of the Christchurch Camerata, Central Coast Philharmonic Choirs, Newcastle Festival Opera and insitutions such as the University of Newcastle, School and Community Music, and the McDonald College.
  • Repetiteur: for various companies, including Newcastle Festival Opera.  Recent works include La Boheme (Puccini), Candide (Bernstein), The Gondeliers (Sullivan), and Threepenny Opera (Weil).
  • Recorded accompaniment/background tracks for various artists ranging from musicians to theatre groups.

SERVICES
Solo & collaborative piano services:
– Solo performance
– Accompaniment & ensemble performance
– Repetiteur services
– Recording
– Tuition
– Piano method

Contact Greg Smith


Posted

in

by


Featured Content

Handel and the soprano
The great singer, Cuzzoni, refused to sing an air of his the way he wished it. He seized her, and, dragging her to a window, threatened to throw her out, thundering, “I always knew you were a devil, but I’ll show you that I am Beelzebub, the prince of devils.” Hughes, Rupert (2004) The Love […]
Widerstehe doch der Sünde (J. S. Bach)
Title: Widerstehe doch der Sünde (from Cantata BWV 54)Composer: Johann Sebastian BachArranger: Greg SmithInstrumentation: PianoProduct medium: PDF score Sample:
Mozart’s piano returns to his home
“The piano that Mozart used for the last 10 years of his life and which he used to compose much of his music was returned to his former home in Vienna for a performance of his music. ‘A big, positive shock was how good the instrument is,’ said Russian pianist Alexander Melnikov after the concert […]
Through a Looking Glass
Title: Through a Looking Glass Composer: Greg Smith Instrumentation: Piano Duet Level: Piano I – level 1 (five finger position) Product medium: PDF score and MP3 accompaniment track (Audio sample of accompaniment track only
A monkey on his shoulder
Cellist Walter Joachim spend some time in Calcutta, India. He recalled: “I bought a monkey with which to amuse myself. We played. He was sitting on my shoulders for hours when I was practising.” Joachim practised at least one or two movements of a Bach suite. “I started my day usually with Bach or a […]
Life experience
“Knowledge about life is one thing; effective occupation of a place in life, with its dynamic currents passing through your being, is another.” – William James, American philosopher and psychologist W. James, Essays in Pragmatism, United Kingdom, Free Press, 1970, p. 113.
Stokowski’s first rehearsal with the Philadelphia Orchestra
On Stokowski’s first rehearsal with the Philadelphia Orchestra: From Oscar Schwar, a fellow faculty member at Curtis who became my friend, I heard the details of Stokowski’s first contact with the orchestra.  He would never forget, he said, that Monday morning of October 7, 1912, when an amazingly young and handsome Stokowski, wearing a light […]
The essential part of creativity
“The essential part of creativity is not being afraid to fail.” Edwin Land, American scientist and inventor.
Heard but not seen
In 1926, conductor Leopold Stokowski inserted the following into the Philadelphia Orchestra programs: The great conviction has been growing in me that the orchestra and conductor should be unseen, so that on the part of the listener more attention will go to the ear and less to the eyes. The experiment of an invisible orchestra […]
Ravel on Debussy
In a lecture in 1928 in Houston, Texas, Ravel described the differences between Debussy and his approach to composition: For Debussy the musician and the man I have had profound admiration, but by nature I am different from him. Although he may not be quite a stranger from my own personal heritage, I would at […]