On Tuesday night, January 21st, Rachel Heard will be offering a rare opportunity to Jackson concert-goers when she presents a recital on an exact replica of an early Viennese piano built around 1795 by Johann Schantz. Haydn, whose music opens her program, was known to have owned and favored instruments by Schantz. The 'modern' replica Dr. Heard will be performing on was built by Thomas and Barbara Wolf of Washington, DC. The Wolfs were formerly instrument curators at the Smithsonian.

Her program will show off the Viennese piano's capabilities by focusing on the three greatest composers who wrote for it, the 'triumvirate' of Viennese classicism, Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. She will begin with Haydn's F Minor Variations, followed by Beethoven's Sonata in D Major, Op. 10, No. 3. After intermission she will play the often-paired Fantasy in C Minor, Op. 475 and Sonata in C Minor, Op. 457, by Mozart.

The pieces Dr. Heard chose for this program not only promise to bring out the full array of colors it is possible to hear on a fortepiano (as opposed to a modern Steinway, for example), but will go against the stereotypes we often associate with each of these composers. As she points out, "Normally one thinks of Haydn's music as playful and witty, Mozart's as beautifully lyrical, and Beethoven's as passionate and stormy. What I love about this program is that each composer, in these particular pieces, seems to take on the personality of one of the other composers! The opening Haydn F Minor Variations are lyrical (Mozartean?), the Beethoven is playful (Haydnesque?), and the Mozart Fantasy and Sonata are both passionate and stormy (Beethovenian?)!"

After earning her undergraduate and Master's degrees from The Juilliard School, Rachel Heard was a student of the fortepianist Malcolm Bilson, and she subsequently earned her doctorate from Rutgers University with a specialization in music of the eighteenth century. Dr. Heard joined the Millsaps College Department of Performing Arts in the Fall of 2002. Before coming to Millsaps she was Chair of the Music Department at Emory & Henry College in Emory, Virginia.

The concert begins at eight o'clock on Tuesday January 21st, in the Gertrude C. Ford Academic Complex Recital Hall on the Millsaps College campus (on Park Avenue, just off N. State Street). Call 974-1422 for directions to the recital hall. The recital is open to the public and is free of charge.