BRAVOPIANO!
MICHAEL BRAZ AND HHSO MUSICIANS Michael Braz, Principal Keyboard of the Hilton Head Symphony Orchestra, is completing his 13-year HHSO tenure with this performance. Dr. Braz received his Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees from the University of Miami and his Ph.D. from Florida State University. During a half-century of piano, harpsichord, celesta, and other keyboard performances, he has participated in such varied concert venues as the Dolmetsch Festival of Early Music (Haslemere, UK), the New Hampshire Music Festival and the Savannah Music Festival. He has previously collaborated with the Portland (ME) Symphony, the Augusta (GA) Symphony, and—most recently—the Charleston Symphony and Savannah Philharmonic. As Professor Emeritus of Music at Georgia Southern University and a 24-year faculty member, Braz has taught coursework in theory, composition/arranging, orchestration, and music education, as well as classes on such subjects as Finale music software and Wagner's Ring Cycle. In demand as a collaborative pianist, clinician, lecturer, and adjudicator, he was also a book and music reviewer for various professional journals and publishers. In the midst of his university career, he embarked on a one-year international sabbatical, instructing faculty and students of various ages and backgrounds at St. Benedict’s Catholic School and Performing Arts College (Derby, England), Nepal Music Center (Kathmandu), and Huazhong Normal University (Wuhan, China). Recipient of an American Composers Forum/Rockefeller Brothers “Faith Partners” grant, Braz has a number of published choral and instrumental compositions and arrangements to his credit, many of which remain in print. Additionally, he has composed two operas: Memoirs from the Holocaust (inspired by a visit to the Dachau concentration camp site) and A Scholar Under Siege, dealing with the 1940’s firing of a respected college president by a populist Georgia governor. His hobbies include comparative religions and trekking the Nepal Himalaya.
This performance is made possible by a generous contribution from Charlie and Joan Dattelbaum.
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2021 BRAVOPIANO FESTIVAL
