TRYON, N.C. - s4story -- Pianist, conductor, educator and curator Awadagin Pratt will perform at the Tryon Fine Arts Center (TFAC), on Saturday Evening October 3^rd.

The gala evening will benefit the newly launched Nina Simone and Samuel Waymon Music Scholarship Fund.

Tickets for the recital are available at TFAC and via the AFRICANCONNECTIONS-dot-com website.

Mr. Pratt served as professor and artist in residence at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music for nineteen years. He is currently Professor of Piano at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and is the driving force behind the Nina Simone Piano Competition for African-American Pianists.

Since winning the Naumburg International Piano Competition in 1992 and receiving a 1994 Avery Fisher Career Grant, Awadagin Pratt has received acclaim for delivering "forceful, imaginative, and precisely tinted" performances (The Washington Post) and been hailed as "one of the great and distinctive American pianists and conductors of our time" (WGBH). He has appeared in venues as familiar as The White House (at the invitation of Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama) and Sesame Street (at the invitation of Big Bird).

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Mr. Pratt has performed with the Boston and Chicago Symphony Orchestras, the New York Philharmonic, and many others; in solo recitals at the Kennedy Center, Carnegie Hall, and Lincoln Center; and in chamber music collaborations with cellist Zuill Bailey, pianist Simone Dinnerstein, and the Harlem and St. Lawrence String Quartets. His 2023 recording, Stillpoint, explores the truth and beauty in T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets.

Honoring the dual legacies of the late singer and pianist Nina Simone (born Eunice Waymon) and her brother, pianist, actor, award winning composer and lecturer Dr. Samuel Waymon, the Nina Simone and Samuel Waymon Music Scholarship Fund has been created to support young musicians from throughout the Southeastern United States. Miss Simone and Dr. Waymon were both born in Tryon, and each received their initial musical training under the watchful eyes of Muriel Mazzanovich.

Catered by The Hare and Hound Pub, a post concert "meet and greet" will be held in the TFAC lobby immediately following Mr. Pratt's performance.

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Fiscal sponsorship of the Nina Simone and Samuel Waymon Music Scholarship Fund is provided by The AFRICAN CONNECTIONS Research and Education Fund, Inc. (ACREF).

Use of the Tryon Fine Arts Center facility has been made possible through the generous support of music patrons Ben Cox and Elizabeth Cummings.

Tickets:
https://app.arts-people.com/?show=338870

Tryon Fine Arts Center:
https://tryonarts.org/event/awadagin-pratt-benefit-recital-simone-waymon-music-scholarship-fund/