Dr. Alessandra Feris, music instructor at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College’s Jackson County Campus, will perform a piano recital featuring the works of Granados, Beethoven, Liszt and Villa-Lobos on Thursday, January 28, at 7 p.m. in the campus Fine Arts Auditorium. The event is free and open to the public.
Following undergraduate studies at the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Brazilian pianist Feris received a grant from Katholischer Akademischer Ausländer-Dienst (better known as KAAD) to study at the Hochschule für Musik ‘Franz Liszt’ in Weimar, Germany, where she received the Artist Diploma under the tutelage of Thomas Steinhöfel and the legendary Lazar Berman. As a student in Weimar, she was awarded a Liszt Foundation fellowship to attend the Béla Bartók International Festival and Seminar in Szombathely, Hungary, and also participated in projects such as the performance of Bach’s entire Das Wohltemperierte Klavier.
In 2001, she came to the United States as a student and teaching assistant of Réne Lecuona at the University of Iowa. In Iowa she earned a master’s degree in piano performance and was awarded the Becker Piano Scholarship as well as the prestigious John Simms Piano Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Study of Music. Under the direction of Carolyn Bridger and Read Gainsford, Feris received a doctoral degree in piano performance at Florida State University in 2009. A devoted doctoral teaching assistant at FSU, she was the recipient of the 2008 Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award.
Since the fall of 2008, Feris has served as piano faculty and artist-in-residence at MGCCC, where she has been working with a wide diversity of students. Committed to excellence in teaching, she received the Mississippi Humanities Council Teacher of the Year Award in 2012. In addition to her position at MGCCC, she has also been a faculty member and performer at Festival Internacional de Pianistas in Mar del Plata, Argentina, since 2011. A sought-after pedagogue, she has been actively adjudicating competitions on both national and international levels, as well as conducting master classes at major universities in the U.S. and abroad.
Feris has as an extensive career as a soloist and chamber musician. She has performed widely in Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Costa Rica, Germany, Hungary and the United States, making successful solo debuts in major venues such as Theatro São Pedro in Porto Alegre (Brazil) and Palácio de Bellas Artes (Sala Manuel M. Ponce) in Mexico City. She has recently been a guest artist/teacher at institutions such as Louisiana State University, James Madison University, Auburn University, The University of Southern Mississippi, Gulf Coast College (Panama City, Florida), Huntingdon College, the University of South Alabama, Universidad de Costa Rica, Southern University, Universidad de Buenos Aires in Argentina, and several universities in Brazil such as UNICAMP (Campinas), UDESC (Florianópolis), UFRGS (Porto Alegre), UFSM (Santa Maria), UFPEL (Pelotas), UFOP (Ouro Preto), UNB (Brasilia) and others. Additionally, she is devoted to the diffusion of Latin-American music and is often requested to premiere works by Brazilian contemporary composers.
A passionate collaborative pianist, Feris enjoys performing with colleagues and is a member of Duo Weimar with cellist Pedro Bielschowsky. She also thrives as a theorist and has strong music-theoretical interests that vary from Schenkerian Analysis to basic-level theory.
Upcoming activities for Feris include a performance/master class at Montclair State University, recital at the Ilse Newell Concert Series in Apalachicola, Florida, serving as an adjudicator at several piano competitions (U.S. and abroad), and a tour in Europe during the summer.