NewsLeader.com
Staff Reports • November 19, 2008
CenterStage! will present the Nutt Family Memorial Concert starring pianist Jade Simmons at 7:30 p.m. Sunday at Robert E. Lee High School in Staunton. Trained at Rice University and Foundation Bell’Arte in Brussels, Belgium, Simmons has performed extensively across Europe and United States, with numerous radio and television performances on NPR and PBS, respectively.
A native of Charleston, S.C. Simmons attended Northwestern University, where she co-founded the immensely popular percussion and dance ensemble Boomshaka. Jade was Miss Illinois and first runner up at the 2000 Miss America Pageant, where she performed Chopin’s “Etude” in c-sharp minor, Op. 10, No. 4, before a live television audience of millions. In 2007-08, Simmons appeared at Ravinia’s “Rising Stars” series in residencies at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute in New York and at Chicago’s Symphony Hall for a concerto engagement with the Chicago Sinfonietta, performing Tania Leon’s Kabiosile. Recent engagements include her debut with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, performing the Corigliano Piano Concerto under the baton of Leslie Dunner and recitals at Symphony Space and Aaron Davis Hall. Her 2005 performance with renowned pianist, Ursula Oppens, of duo piano works by Tania Leon, was listed as one of the “Year’s Best Concerts” by Artforum magazine.
The Staunton concert will include music crossing the centuries, including Mozart, Chopin, Rachmaninoff and into the more recent Corigliano and Leon works. As a New Music/New Places fellow, Simmons is passionate about the role of the arts in education and created Mozart on the Move, a program that was used with great success in the Houston public school system. In spring 2007, she continued her educational activities under the auspices of the Van Cliburn Foundation’s Musical Awakenings series, visiting 25 schools throughout the Dallas/Fort Worth area in a program entitled Virtuosity. An artist with a social conscience that moves her to action, Simmons serves as an advocate for American youth, addressing groups across the country on sensitive issues, such as suicide prevention and youth violence. She is the founder of the national school program, Where Do You Stand? — a series of interactive presentations on topics from culture to politics. For more information, call 885-4460 or visit http://www.centerstagestaunton.com. [The Afro-Cuban composer and conductor Tania Justina León (b. 1943) is profiled at AfriClassical.com]
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