Music by Saint-Saens and Mozart

The American Liszt Society Annual Festival runs September 28-30 at The University of Nebraska-Lincoln Wednesday, September 30, 2026. 2:20pm Kimball Recital Hall Complete performance of Années de pèlerinage, troisième année Introduction: Jay Hershberger

1. Angélus! Prière aux anges gardiens (Angelus! Prayer to the Guardian Angels) Caroline Hong, The Ohio State University

2. Aux cyprès de la Villa d'Este I: Thrénodie (To the Cypresses of the Villa d'Este I: Threnody) Joseph Kingma, Tulsa Oklahoma

3. Aux cyprès de la Villa d'Este II: Thrénodie (To the Cypresses of the Villa d'Este II: Threnody) Derek Parsons, Furman University

4. Les jeux d'eaux à la Villa d'Este (The Fountains of the Villa d'Este) Gergely Kovács, Budapest, Hungary

5. Sunt lacrymae rerum/En mode hongrois (The Sense of Tears in Mortal Things/In Hungarian Style) Scott Watkins, University of North Florida

6. Marche funèbre, En mémoire de Maximilien I, Empereur du Mexique (Funeral March, In memory of Emperor Maximilian of Mexico)

7. Sursum corda (Lift Up Your Hearts) Ryan Behan, University of Indianapolis

Scott Watkins with hornist Kevin Reid and violinist Igor Khukhua - Brahms: Trio in E-flat major, Op. 40, and Beethoven Trio in B-flat major, Op. 11, with clarinetist Giovanni Bertoni, and cellist Alexei Romanenko.

Dr. Scott Watkins, adjunct professor of music at the University of North Florida, and keyboardist with the Jacksonville Symphony, will present a solo piano recital exploring the music of American composers Edward MacDowell and Howard Hanson on November 6. The program opens with MacDowell’s Sonata Tragica (Piano Sonata No. 1) and includes Hanson’s rarely performed Piano Sonata in A minor (1918). It will also feature the world premiere of Jacksonville composer Benjamin Shorstein’s Piano Sonata, composed in 2018. A recognized authority on the music of Howard Hanson, Watkins published his edition of Hanson’s Symphonic Rhapsody, Op. 14 with Carl Fischer Music in 2017 after discovering the previously unpublished manuscript in Rochester, New York. He also gave the New York premiere of Hanson’s Piano Sonata at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, where New York Concert Review praised his performance as “a highly praiseworthy concert … played with the fidelity of a music historian … a fulfilling musical evening.”

American Blueprints

Pianist Scott Watkins presents an all-American recital tracing the architectural foundations of the nation’s piano literature—from its earliest bold statements to a newly emerging voice.

The program features Edward MacDowell’s sweeping Piano Sonata No. 1, Op. 45 (“Tragica”) alongside Howard Hanson’s Piano Sonata in A minor, Op. 11 (1918), a long-overlooked work of striking Romantic intensity and lyricism. Watkins made the world premiere recording of Hanson’s sonata following the discovery of its manuscript in 2007, helping to restore the piece to the American repertoire.

The recital culminates in the world premiere performance of a new Piano Sonata by Benjamin Shorstein, offering audiences the rare opportunity to hear a major work at the moment of its arrival.

Spanning more than a century, American Blueprints reveals a living tradition—one in which voices are not only inherited, but rediscovered and newly realized.

Free and open to the public.