Acclaimed pianist back to his roots for fundraiser

Photo by Photo by Antonio Notarberardino

Pianist Bruce Levingston of Cleveland, Miss., will have two concerts this week in Mississippi.

In his apartment in New York's famed Chelsea Hotel, pianist Bruce Levingston surrounds himself with mementos of his Southern upbringing.

He shows off pottery from the renowned McCarty studio in Merigold, Miss., where he grew up roaming the family's gardens. His current canine companion, Harper Lee, was adopted after the death of his former pooch, Bolivar (like the county in Mississippi.)

Though his hometown of Cleveland, Miss., is best known for its blues legacy, Levingston is a native son of a different order -- a classical pianist who has performed at Carnegie Hall and runs his own nonprofit foundation to commission new classical work.

Levingston returns to his youthful haunts this week with two diverse concerts featuring the acclaimed string quartet Brooklyn Rider. On Tuesday, he performs at Delta State University's Bologna Performing Arts Center. Then, on Thursday, he'll play a special concert at the Ford Center at Ole Miss to raise funds for the center and the University of Mississippi Museum.

"I'm always setting challenges for myself," he says, laughing about the scale of the program for which he is now practicing (at seven hours a day) solos by Rachmaninoff, duets by Dvorak and Arvo Part, tangos by Astor Piazzolla and even the entirety of Saint-Saens' fanciful "Carnival of the Animals."

Visual artists in the area have painted 14 different animal pictures to be displayed at the performance and auctioned off later.

Levingston says that his need to collaborate with visual artists, dancers and musicians of other stripes is one of the lessons of his upbringing.

"In my region of the Delta, people know how to connect," he says. "We talk to each other. We share. I grew up playing music in churches, listening to jazz and blues. My family was always involved with the arts. New York can be like a big small town in some ways. Not to mention that Southern hospitality, graciousness and manners go far here."

At the Chelsea Hotel, he befriended a neighbor, the actor Ethan Hawke, who lent his voice to a Levingston project. After meeting the Pulitzer Prize winning composer William Bolcom, Levingston received a gift in the mail one day: a piano version of Bolcom's acclaimed post-9/11 work, "New York Lights," which Levingston will perform at both concerts.

With support from David Rockefeller (of the Rockefeller Foundation), Levingston started his own foundation, Premiere Commission, Inc., which commissions new works from composers.

He's particularly fond of one piece by influential composer Philip Glass, who wrote a musical portrait of the artist Chuck Close, himself famed for painting large, photorealist portraits. Levingston will perform an excerpt from that commission.

"It's a masterpiece that involves so many levels of art and society," Levingston said. "These two artists knew each other all their lives. There is something so special working with living composers. You get to be part of the artistic birthing process."

Levingston ascribes his eclectic musical tastes to his parents, Barbara and Douglas Levingston. His mother taught him to play the piano. His father had interests in several radio stations and had a record collection full of jazz, blues and everything else.

In the classical music industry, where "new" music is not considered commercial enough and performers tend to stick to the well known chestnuts, Levingston holds a progressive view.

"I like to say that there is no 'new' music, just music," he said. "At one time Mozart made new music. Beethoven made new music. Unless you promote contemporary composers, you'll never know what might be the great masterpiece of tomorrow."

Bruce Levingston and Friends in Concert

7:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Bologna Performing Arts Center at Delta State University, 1003 West Sunflower, in Cleveland, Miss., Tickets are $16-$36. Call (662) 846-4626.

7 p.m. Thursday at the Ford Center for the Performing Arts, 100 University Avenue, on the University of Mississippi campus. Tickets are $21-$29. Call (662) 915-7411.

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