Two musical programs next week

The Hot Springs Greater Learning Foundation is bringing two music-based programs to Thermopolis this next week.

The Piatigorsky Foundation is sending American Soprano Katharine Dain, and keyboardist and conductor Jeffrey Grossman. The pair will conduct a workshop at the Hot Springs County High School band room, beginning at 9:20 a.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 20, followed by a presentation at the Pioneer Home beginning at 2 p.m.

Dain has been praised for “thrilling” and “heart-piercing” performances, and has performed with orchestras and operas throughout the United States and Europe. She has appeared at New York’s Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Vienna’s Musikverein and Konzerthaus, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Paris Philharmonie.

Among Dain’s education is study at Harvard University, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London and Mannes College of Music in New York. She currently lives in the Netherlands.

Grossman specializes in vital, engaging performances of music of the past, through processes that are intensely collaborative and historically informed. In addition to serving as artistic director for the baroque ensemble The Sebastians, he also is performing this year with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, The Green Mountain Project and New York Baroque Incorporated, as well as several others.

A native of Detroit, he holds degrees from Harvard, Jiulliard and Carnegie Mellon University. He currently resides in New York.

Hot Springs County Greater Learning Foundation Director Jacky Wright said the Piatigorsky Foundation regularly sends high caliber programs, though with such short notice there was no time to set up a public performance.

On Friday, Sept. 22, Thermopolis Middle School will be host to folksinger, storyteller and autoharp virtuoso Adam Miller, during an assembly beginning at 10:30 a.m. in the commons area.

A renowned American folksinger and natural-born storyteller, Miller accompanies his voice with acoustic guitar and autoharp. He has been described as “one of the great autoharpists of our time.”

With an audio-graphic memory and a good ear for melody, when he was a child he wanted to learn every song he heard; he now has a repertoire of over 5,000 songs. Mostly self-taught, he learns nearly everything by ear.

He travels 70,000 miles a year, performing over 200 concerts from the Everglades to the Arctic Circle. He has also performed in over 2,000 public libraries in 48 states. Further, his six recorded CDs receive airplay across North America and Europe.

Frank Hamilton, co-founder of the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago and former member of the folk quartet The Weavers says, “His performance is truly entertaining and riveting. He’s doing a real service for folk music: defending the Treasury of American Tradition.”