Black History Month Celebration: Piano Pieces by Joplin, Wiggins, Bonds, & more

• Diana Gao, piano
• Lisa Lanza, piano
• Whitney Henderson, commentary

Scott Joplin — The Entertainer (Diana Gao, piano)
Scott Joplin — Maple Leaf Rag (Diana Gao, piano)
Thomas "Blind Tom" Wiggins — The Battle of Manassas (Diana Gao, piano)
Betty Jackson King — Four Seasonal Sketches ("I. Spring Intermezzo"; Lisa Lanza, piano)
William Grant Still — Three Visions ("I. Dark Horsemen" & "II. Summerland"; Lisa Lanza, piano)
Margaret Bonds — "III. Troubled Water" from Spiritual Suite (Lisa Lanza, piano)

Piano Pieces by Scott Joplin, "Blind Tom" Wiggins, Margaret Bonds, and more. With commentary by Whitney Henderson, PhD.

Made up of musicians and music advocates, the Ladies Musical Club of Seattle (LMC) is a 501(c)3 organization that has been fostering classical music in the community through education, performance, and awards since 1891. We do this by offering music and education programs to people of all ages and diverse backgrounds across the region and throughout Washington State.

About Ladies Musical Club of Seattle

http://www.lmcseattle.org/

About Diana Gao, piano

Diana Gao began studying piano at age 4. She moved to the U.S. from China in 2013 to pursue her MBA at the University of Washington (UW), and is currently a Senior Marketing Manager at Microsoft. Although she has pursued a career outside of music, the piano has remained a significant mainstay in her life. She has consistently cultivated her passion through regular lessons and performances. She’s been studying with Dr. Robin McCabe from UW and is a prizewinner in many competitions, including Gold Medalist of the Seattle International Competition and First Prize of the "Golden Classical Music Awards" International Competition. She also performed at the prestigious Piano Texas International Festival. Since 2020, she has presented annual fundraising recitals through the Microsoft Give campaign, raising thousands of dollars in support of local organizations. Those events reinforced her belief that music has the power to inspire change and make the world a better place.

https://pianotexas.tcu.edu/artists/profile/teachers_amateurs/diana-gao.php

About Lisa Lanza, piano

Lisa Lanza as been performing as a solo artist and collaborator for over thirty years on the Olympic Peninsula and in the greater Seattle Area. She has studied with the pianist Maria Joao Pires at Belgais, Portugal and Paul Roberts at The Guildhall School of Theater and Arts in London. She holds a Master of Music degree in Piano Performance and Accompanying from The University of Redlands. As a guest artist she has performed on the Music at St. Leonard’s concert series, Hythe, England, the Young Concert Artists Competition, at Weill Hall, NY, the Olympic Music Festival, Quilcene, WA, Sierra Opera Institute's chamber music series, Mammoth, CA, the Bloedel Reserve, Bainbridge Island, WA. As an opera and musical theater accompanist she has worked with companies from Orange County to Seattle Opera, to Issaquah’s Village Theater and Key City Players in Port Townsend. She holds 1st and 2nd prize medals from the Greater Spokane Music & Allied Arts Festival for her interpretations of Beethoven and Chopin.

http://www.lisalanza.com/

About Whitney Henderson, commentary

Whitney Henderson received her PhD in Music History from the University of Washington in 2018, with her dissertation on Women, Place, Repertory, Race, and The Ladies Musical Club of Seattle, 1891-1950, and is finishing an MLIS program. Before stepping into her current role as LMC's Executive Director, she served as LMC's Archives Trustee from 2014 to 2021, where she curated, digitized, and expanded the LMC's substantial archives. She is publishing an LMC-commissioned book, 'The Ladies Musical Club of Seattle: 130 Years of Cultivating Music in Seattle' (forthcoming), and has presented on LMC's history at national musicology conferences. An experienced and trained grant writer, editor, and educator, Whitney has also designed various works and websites. She spent four years at Amazon.com in Strategic Planning, and taught at UW for eight years while completing her music studies. Her research interests include: Pacific Northwest music history; American popular and art music; women's music clubs; music archiving methods; music and genre; sheet music; reception history.