Denver Oldham
Encyclopedia
Denver Oldham is an American
concert pianist
and recording artist. A Steinway Artist, he has to his credit twelve European concert tours, two South American concert tours, as well as numerous domestic performances. He has recorded ten albums to date, paying special attention to the works of neglected American composers. He was born in Long Island, New York to Scottish immigrants and currently lives in Evans, Georgia
.
of Music, where he studied under Joseph Bloch
and Leland Thompson. He subsequently studied in London with Dame Myra Hess and Ilona Kabos and at the Aspen Music Festival with Alexander Uninsky
. At the age of 24, Oldham went on his first European concert tour, which spanned Copenhagen
, Zurich
, Oslo
, The Hague
, and Vienna
. In 1961, he made his New York City
debut at The Town Hall
. He later performed at both Philharmonic Hall (later renamed Avery Fisher Hall
) in the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
and at Carnegie Hall
. Continuing European tours have taken him to Basel
, Amsterdam
, Berlin
, Brussels
, Dublin, and London
.
Since the 1982, Denver Oldham has built up a library of recordings highlighting the works of varied, often underrepresented or minority American composers. The list includes composers such as Charles Tomlinson Griffes, John Alden Carpenter
, R. Nathaniel Dett, William Grant Still
, John Knowles Paine
, and Angelo Musolino. He has also recorded the works of European composers Jacques Ibert
, Enrique Granados
, and Franz Liszt
. Oldham's first album, Charles Tomlinson Griffes: Collected Works for Piano, sold more than 80,000 copies, and his recordings have been featured on the National Public Radio show Performance Today.
. TIME magazine named John Alden Carpenter: Collected Piano Works as one of the top ten best classical recordings of 1986. Equinox Piano Concerto from the 2006 album Angelo Musolino: Orchestral Works was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize
in music.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
concert pianist
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...
and recording artist. A Steinway Artist, he has to his credit twelve European concert tours, two South American concert tours, as well as numerous domestic performances. He has recorded ten albums to date, paying special attention to the works of neglected American composers. He was born in Long Island, New York to Scottish immigrants and currently lives in Evans, Georgia
Evans, Georgia
Evans is a census-designated place in Columbia County, Georgia, United States. It is an affluent suburb of Augusta and is part of the Augusta - Richmond County Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 17,727 at the 2000 census and, in 2006, the population was 20,681.Evans, possibly named...
.
Early life
Denver Oldham first began formal piano lessons at the age of five with Edna Dalton after his kindergarten teacher discovered him improvising on nursery rhymes. By the age of twelve he was performing with symphonies in the Long Island area regularly, and he soon held his first public solo recital at the behest of the Music Education League.Career
Oldham graduated from the Juilliard SchoolJuilliard School
The Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, United States, is a performing arts conservatory which was established in 1905...
of Music, where he studied under Joseph Bloch
Joseph Bloch
Joseph Meyer Bloch was an American concert pianist and professor of piano literature at the Juilliard School in New York City. During a career at Juilliard that spanned five decades, Bloch's students included Emanuel Ax, Van Cliburn, Misha Dichter, Garrick Ohlsson, Jeffrey Siegel and Jeffrey Swann...
and Leland Thompson. He subsequently studied in London with Dame Myra Hess and Ilona Kabos and at the Aspen Music Festival with Alexander Uninsky
Alexander Uninsky
-Life and career:Alexander Uninsky was born in Kiev . He initially studied piano there in the conservatory which had been opened in 1913, and whose other graduates included Vladimir Horowitz and Alexander Brailowsky....
. At the age of 24, Oldham went on his first European concert tour, which spanned Copenhagen
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
, Zurich
Zürich
Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...
, Oslo
Oslo
Oslo is a municipality, as well as the capital and most populous city in Norway. As a municipality , it was established on 1 January 1838. Founded around 1048 by King Harald III of Norway, the city was largely destroyed by fire in 1624. The city was moved under the reign of Denmark–Norway's King...
, The Hague
The Hague
The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...
, and Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
. In 1961, he made his New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
debut at The Town Hall
The Town Hall
The Town Hall is a performance space, located at 123 West 43rd Street, between Sixth Avenue and Broadway, in New York City. It seats approximately 1,500 people.-History:...
. He later performed at both Philharmonic Hall (later renamed Avery Fisher Hall
Avery Fisher Hall
Avery Fisher Hall is a concert hall, in New York City and is part of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts complex. It is the home of the New York Philharmonic, with a capacity of 2,738 seats.-History:...
) in the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts is a complex of buildings in the Lincoln Square neighborhood of New York City's Upper West Side. Reynold Levy has been its president since 2002.-History and facilities:...
and at Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
. Continuing European tours have taken him to Basel
Basel
Basel or Basle In the national languages of Switzerland the city is also known as Bâle , Basilea and Basilea is Switzerland's third most populous city with about 166,000 inhabitants. Located where the Swiss, French and German borders meet, Basel also has suburbs in France and Germany...
, Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
, Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
, Dublin, and London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
.
Since the 1982, Denver Oldham has built up a library of recordings highlighting the works of varied, often underrepresented or minority American composers. The list includes composers such as Charles Tomlinson Griffes, John Alden Carpenter
John Alden Carpenter
John Alden Carpenter was an American composer.-Biography:Born in Park Ridge, Illinois, Carpenter was raised in a musical household. He was educated at Harvard University, where he studied under John Knowles Paine, and was president of the Glee Club and wrote music for the Hasty-Pudding Club...
, R. Nathaniel Dett, William Grant Still
William Grant Still
William Grant Still was an African-American classical composer who wrote more than 150 compositions. He was the first African American to conduct a major American symphony orchestra, the first to have a symphony performed by a leading orchestra, the first to have an opera performed by a major...
, John Knowles Paine
John Knowles Paine
John Knowles Paine , was the first American-born composer to achieve fame for large-scale orchestral music.-Life:He studied organ, orchestration, and composition in Germany and toured in Europe for three years...
, and Angelo Musolino. He has also recorded the works of European composers Jacques Ibert
Jacques Ibert
Jacques François Antoine Ibert was a French composer. Having studied music from an early age, he studied at the Paris Conservatoire and won its top prize, the Prix de Rome at his first attempt, despite studies interrupted by his service in World War I.Ibert pursued a successful composing career,...
, Enrique Granados
Enrique Granados
Enrique Granados y Campiña was a Spanish pianist and composer of classical music. His music is in a uniquely Spanish style and, as such, representative of musical nationalism...
, and Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt ; ), was a 19th-century Hungarian composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher.Liszt became renowned in Europe during the nineteenth century for his virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age...
. Oldham's first album, Charles Tomlinson Griffes: Collected Works for Piano, sold more than 80,000 copies, and his recordings have been featured on the National Public Radio show Performance Today.
Honors
The National Guild of Piano Teachers awarded Denver Oldham the Paderewski Gold Medal, and the Music Education League awarded him a Gold Medal on two separate occasions. His albums Charles Tomlinson Griffes: Collected Works for Piano and John Alden Carpenter: Collected Piano Works were each nominated for a Grammy AwardGrammy Award
A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
. TIME magazine named John Alden Carpenter: Collected Piano Works as one of the top ten best classical recordings of 1986. Equinox Piano Concerto from the 2006 album Angelo Musolino: Orchestral Works was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
in music.
Discography
- Charles Tomlinson Griffes: Collected Works for Piano (1982) New World RecordsNew World RecordsNew World Records is a record label based in New York City specialising in American music. The label was established in 1975 through a Rockefeller Foundation grant to produce a 100 disc anthology covering 200 years of American music....
- John Alden Carpenter: Collected Piano Works (1986) New World RecordsNew World RecordsNew World Records is a record label based in New York City specialising in American music. The label was established in 1975 through a Rockefeller Foundation grant to produce a 100 disc anthology covering 200 years of American music....
- R. Nathaniel Dett: Piano Works (1992) New World RecordsNew World RecordsNew World Records is a record label based in New York City specialising in American music. The label was established in 1975 through a Rockefeller Foundation grant to produce a 100 disc anthology covering 200 years of American music....
- John Knowles Paine: Selected Piano Works (1995) New World RecordsNew World RecordsNew World Records is a record label based in New York City specialising in American music. The label was established in 1975 through a Rockefeller Foundation grant to produce a 100 disc anthology covering 200 years of American music....
- William Grant Still, R. Nathaniel Dett: Piano Music (1996) Altarus RecordsAltarus RecordsAltarus Records is a classical music record label.-Featured pianists:* Donna Amato* Joseph Banowetz* Charles Hopkins* John Ogdon* Jonathan Powell* Ronald Stevenson* Adam Wodnicki...
- Jacques Ibert: Piano Works (2003) Altarus RecordsAltarus RecordsAltarus Records is a classical music record label.-Featured pianists:* Donna Amato* Joseph Banowetz* Charles Hopkins* John Ogdon* Jonathan Powell* Ronald Stevenson* Adam Wodnicki...
- Angelo Musolino: Orchestral Works (2006) Albany RecordsAlbany RecordsAlbany Records is an American classical music record label focusing particularly on contemporary classical music. It was established by Peter Kermani in 1987, and is based in Albany, New York.-External links:**...
External links
- Track listing for Charles Tomlinson Griffes: Collected Works for Piano
- Track listing for John Alden Carpenter: Collected Piano Works
- Track listing for R. Nathaniel Dett: Piano Works
- Track listing for John Knowles Paine: Selected Piano Works
- Track listing for William Grant Still, R. Nathaniel Dett: Piano Music
- Track listing for Jacques Ibert: Piano Works
- Track listing for Angelo Musolino: Orchestral Works