Awadagin Pratt, piano

Awadagin Pratt has performed extensively throughout the Baltimore-Washington area. He has given recitals at the Walters Art Gallery, the Second Prebyterian Church (as winner of the Russell Wonderlic Competition), the French Embassy, Library of Congress, the Smithsonian (as member of the Tigoh String Quartet), and, with Earl Carlyss, a recital of Brahms Violin Sonatas and the Southampton Performing Arts Festival, Southampton, Long Island. In addition to having been selected to participate in the Ravinia Festival Young Artists Institute in 1990 and Pianofest in the Hamptons in 1990 and 1991, Mr. Pratt was invited to be a Resident Artist at the Banff Centre for the Arts in Canada in the spring and summer of 1991 where he performed solo and chamber repertoire as a violinist and pianist and conducted works of resident composers. He has been a staff accompanist at the Meadowmount School for Strings and at Musicorda in Mount Holyoke, Massachusetts, and has been broadcast on radio stations in Baltimore (WJHU) and New York (WQXR).

Educated at the University of Illinois and at the Peabody Conservatory, Awadagin was already a seasoned performer by the time he graduated with a Performer's Certificate in piano and violin from Peabody in 1989. He is currently in the Artist Diploma Program at Peabody studying piano and conducting with Leon Fleisher and Frederik Prausnitz. Mr. Pratt has had a series of successes in piano competitions, winning the Mieczyslaw Munz and Dan Saslow Concerto Competitions at Peabody and the National Society of Arts and Letters Competition in Washington. He was a finalist in competitions run by the St. Louis and Portland (Maine) symphony orchestras, and in the American Pianists Association Fellowship Auditions in Indianapolis.

October 26, 1991