I knew from a very early age that music, and especially the piano, would play a pivotal role in my life,” says Michael Stewart. “The piano gives me motivation… it provides an emotional and creative outlet…

it has been a good friend…and it has taught me life skills such as being dedicated, patient, perseverant, and goal-oriented.” This has

led Michael to excellence in piano and academic performance. He

has been on the Dean’s List at the University of Utah since 2007,

is a member of three honor societies, was valedictorian of his high school class, and has received several academic awards, including the West Valley City Mayor’s “Star of Excellence” Award.

Highlights of his piano awards include first prizes in the Utah Symphony “Salute to Youth” Auditions, the University of Utah Concerto Competition, Aloha International Piano Competition in Hawaii, and the Coeur d’Alene Symphony National Competition in Idaho. He was also a prizewinner in the Liszt-Garrison International Piano Competition in Maryland, and the Snowy Range Piano Competition in Wyoming.

Michael’s goals are to complete his undergraduate studies and earn      a Doctor of Musical Arts Degree that will prepare him to teach as a piano faculty member in collaboration with other faculty, and to research and write about music. He further plans to be actively engaged in improving his community by working on projects with service organizations. Michael is currently studying at the University     of Utah with Susan Duehlmeier.

Joel Harrison is Artistic Director, President and Chief Executive Officer of the American Pianists Association, an organization that discovers, promotes and advances the careers of young American world-class jazz and classical pianists. In this position, he is responsible for an extensive, unique and highly competitive fellowship program that provides career assistance worth over $75,000 over a period of two years for one Jazz Cole Porter Fellow and two Classical Fellows.

Other programs under the direction of Dr. Harrison are the DeHaan National Orchestra Program, a nationwide program of concerto performances with orchestras performed by APA Fellows; PianoFest,a national and international touring program; Music Matters, an in-house recital series for friends of APA; the Concerto Curriculum, an educational and community outreach program; and a new classical concert seriesin the 2009-2010 season, Grand Encounters that will debut with a recital by André Watts.

Through collaborations with the U. S. State Department,Dr. Harrison tours internationally as a United States cultural envoy in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, the Caucasus and Northern Africawith the APAClassical and Jazz Fellows.

Dr. Harrison judges for international piano competitions and

was a music consultant for Sky magazine of Delta Airlines and co-produced a highly acclaimed APA series of three compact discs on the Harmonia Mundi label, which is marketed internationally. As a concert artist, Dr. Harrison performed with critical success on two occasions at Weill Hall of Carnegie Hall, and with his colleague,Lana Johns, performed extensively in Europe and the United States.

Prior to his appointment with the American Pianist Association, Dr. Harrison was on the faculties at Davidson College in North Carolina and Mississippi State University, where he was also Director of the Mississippi Piano Showcase and Touring Artist for the Mississippi Arts Commission. Dr. Harrison received degrees from the University of North Carolina, Indiana University and Northwestern University. He continued with his education in Switzerland, Austria and Italy, where he studied with Guido Agosti. He lives in Indianapolis and, in addition to his music activities, pursues interests in contemporary art and architecture.

American Pianists Association Web site

merican pianist Robert McDonald has performed extensively throughout the United States, Europe, Latin America, and the Far East as a soloist and in chamber recitals. His leading violin partners have been Isaac Stern and Midori. He also performs with Yung Uck Kim, Nadja Salerno–Sonnenberg and Elmar Oliverira, among other artists.

Mr. McDonald has a strong commitment to music education. He is on the piano faculties of both the Juilliard School and the Curtis Institute of Music and is director of the keyboard program of the Taos School of Music and Chamber Music Festival in New Mexico. He is a former faculty member at the North Carolina School of the Arts, Oberlin and the Peabody Conservatories, and gives classes regularly at the Glenn Gould Professional School in Toronto. Other summer teaching and festival activities include those in Bergen, Besançon, Lucerne, Montreux, Salzburg, Aldeburgh, and Schleswig –Holstein festivals in Europe, the Marlboro, Brevard and Caramoor festivals in the United States, and the International School of Musical and Arts and the Banff Center in Canada. He also gives piano and chamber music master classes at prominent universities and music schools in the United States, Canada, Japan and Korea.

An active chamber musician, he has performed with the Juilliard, American, Muir, Takács, Brentano, Fine Arts, St. Lawrence, Borromeo, Shanghai, Orlando, and Chicago quartets, as well as with Musicians from Marlboro on several of their tours. He has also appeared as soloist with the San Francisco, Baltimore,

Milwaukee, Omaha, and Curtis symphony orchestras, the Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional of Costa Rica, and the Orchestra Sinfonica Haydn di Bolzano e Trento in Italy. In addition, he has given concerts for the Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society, the Chicago Chamber Musicians, NHK and BBC television Worldwide.

Among numerous awards, prizes, and grants, Mr. McDonald won the Gold Medal at the Busoni International Piano Competition in Italy, and top prizes at the William Kapell and Washington International Competitions in the United States. He is also the recipient of the National Federation of Music Clubs Artist Award, a National Endowment for the Arts Solo Recitalist Grant, and a Career Grant from the Philadelphia Foundation Arthur Hill Fund.

Mr. McDonald’s extensive recordings include those for Sony Classical, Vox, Bridge, Musical Heritage, CRI and ASV. An album of French sonata repertoire with Midori for Sony Classical received the Deutscher Schallplatten Critic’s prize in 2002.

A magna cum laude graduate of Lawrence University in Wisconsin, where Theodore Rehl was his principal teacher, Mr. McDonald continued his studies at the Curtis Institute of Music with Seymour Lipkin, Rudolf Serkin, and Mieczyslaw Horszowski; at the Juilliard School with Beveridge Webster; andat the Manhattan School of Music with Gary Graffman.

Robert McDonald's biography on Taos School of Music Web site