Asher Armstrong gives his debut performance in NWA through the new Department of Music Accent Faculty Performance Series. Join the Department in a live premiere at 7:30 p.m. today, Thursday, Jan. 28, on YouTube. The pre-recorded performance includes an interesting three-angled recorded performance from Armstrong's studio in the Billingsley Music Building. 

Armstrong joins the University of Arkansas from the University of Toronto as assistant professor of piano. In addition to teaching duties in the piano performance program in the Department of Music, Armstrong maintains an active concert career: notable recent engagements include concerto soloist with the Mozart Players of Toronto (Mozart's Piano Concerto in G major, K. 453), the Pax Christi Chorale (Beethoven's Choral Fantasy), soloist with the North York Concert Orchestra (Tchaikovsky's B-flat minor Piano Concerto), faculty solo and chamber recitals at the University of Toronto, and appearances as a guest soloist and masterclass clinician both Canada and the U.S. A member of the Royal Conservatory's College of Examiners, Armstrong adjudicates hundreds of pianists across North America every year. As an enthusiastic music scholar, he has been published by such celebrated institutions as Cambridge University Press (see his 2016 essay in Tempo), Clavier, and has forthcoming work in American Music Teacher.

Armstrong's performance for the Accent Series includes the late piano works by Johannes Brahms (1833-1897). Armstrong writes in his program notes:

It is a rare gift to be able to experience so lucidly and intimately the inner world of another human being such as is the case with Brahms's last works for piano. These 20 piano pieces, separated into four opuses (Opp. 116, 117, 118, and 119), are rightly celebrated by music theorists and historians for their masterful architecture and compositional rigour...

Selections for the concert include 7 Fantasien (Op. 116), 3 Intermezzi (Op. 117), 6 Klavierstüke (Op. 118), 4 Klavierstüke (Op. 119), and Intermezzo in B minor (Op. 119, No. 1). 

Events in the Accent Faculty Performance Series
Performances are at 7:30 p.m. Thursdays via the Department of Music's YouTube Channel.

• Jan. 28 — Asher Armstrong, assistant professor, piano
• Feb. 4 — Alan Gosman, associate professor, piano
• Feb. 11 — Jake Hertzog, professor, guitar
• March 4 — Theresa Delaplain, teaching assistant professor, oboe; and Robert Mueller, professor, piano
• March 11— Moon-Sook Park, associate professor, soprano; Jeffrey Murdock, associate professor, tenor; Hyun Kim, visiting assistant professor, piano