About Nathan
Hailed as "wonderfully poetic," (Westfalen Post), “exuberant yet sensitive,” (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette) and “very compelling in his power and presence” (International Composer), Nathan Carterette has distinguished himself in the concert world by performing a huge range of works from Elizabethan keyboard music to music written today. His innovative, approachable ‘Poets of the Piano’ has inspired audiences to approach unfamiliar music with open ears, and familiar music with new appreciation.
Appearing as soloist, Nathan has been presented in such venues as Weill Recital Hall and the Yamaha Piano Salon of New York City, the Gasteig in Munich, the Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe of Hamburg, Cleveland’s Trinity Cathedral, and Pittsburgh’s Rodef Shalom; in several universities such as the Berklee School of Music, Cleveland Institute of Music, Baldwin Wallace Conservatory, Busan National University of South Korea, and Carnegie-Mellon.
Educated at Yale University, where he studied with Boris Berman, and University of Missouri-Kansas City, where he studied with Robert Weirich, Nathan began his piano studies at the age of eleven with Cleveland’s legendary Birute and Anthony Smetona. A chance encounter in 2004 with Welsh composer-pianist Dafydd Llywelyn led to an invitation for intensive private study in Munich, where Nathan studied and performed for three years.
Nathan, together with organist Edward Alan Moore, form The Arsenal Duo. They have performed many concerts throughout the country, from their 2013 debut in the historic Stambaugh Auditorium in Youngstown, OH; they were also featured performers there for the 2017 American Guild of Organists Great Lakes Regional Convention.
For a list of this season’s available programs, visit here.
POETS OF THE PIANO
Calligraphy and design by Cheryl Jacobsen
Poets of the Piano is an innovative narrative-recital, featuring a wide range of piano music organized around common themes. Inspired by the never-ending expressive possibilities of the piano, these programs are able to weave together traditional repertoire as well as new music, bringing together composers of all generations and aesthetics. Through a story-telling styled narration, the listener will hopefully come away with new appreciation for the familiar, and excitement for the new.
In 2018-2019, Nathan took ‘Poets’ on a 25-city American tour, crossing the country from Santa Cruz to Tallahassee. Programs on that tour included ‘The Cosmopolitan Pianist’ (works written with nationality in mind, either borrowed or native: Bach, Liszt, Gottschalk, Chopin, and Dinos Constantinides); ‘Phantasmagoria’ (works depicting supernatural phenomena: Liszt, Beethoven, Nikolai Medtner, Quentin Kim); ‘A Night at the Theater’ (music transcribed from stage to solo piano: Mozart, Liszt, Prokofiev, Stephen Hough’s Rodgers & Hammerstein transcriptions); and ‘Acts of Faith’ (composers’ search for the spiritually transcendent: Bach, Philip Glass, Judith Shatin, Scriabin).
‘Poets of the Piano: Acts of Faith’ was recorded and is available on all digital music sites as well as in hard copy from this site. It is the first in a projected series of recordings of the ‘Poets’ programs. The hard copy features an essay written by Nathan connecting the visions of each of the composers, living in different times and places.
BACH
Cheryl Jacobsen’s assemblage pictured on the cover of GV
Nathan is known for his brilliant and engaging performances of Bach. He has performed the complete Well-Tempered Clavier in concert, and the Goldberg Variations dozens of times, in America, Asia and Europe. In addition to his solo performances of the Goldberg Variations, in 2019 Nathan collaborated with Pittsburgh’s Attack Theatre, a modern dance company, to create ‘The Rube Goldberg Variations,’ a theatrical narrative and dance piece accompanied by live performance of the Variations.
Hailed as the ‘most creative’ dance production of 2019, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette also wrote, 'Nathan Carterette delivered an exuberant yet sensitive interpretation from memory, exuding both polish and spontaneity in equal measure.’ The show ran for six sold-out performances.
In conjunction with that production, Nathan recorded and released the Goldberg Variations with an original art-piece assemblage by Cheryl Jacobsen gracing the cover: a Rube Goldberg machine that after a series of complex gestures, churns out the music. The recording is available on all digital music sites, and in hard copy from this website.
A live performance, recorded in the Fred Rogers Studio of WQED, also became that radio station’s most requested pledge item.
COMPOSERS
Driven by insatiable curiosity and the love of the new, Nathan has collaborated intensely with many composers, finding innovative ways to program their music and share it with new audiences. In 2004, a chance encounter with Welsh composer-pianist Dafydd Llywelyn led to an invitation to Munich, where Nathan studied traditional repertoire as well as Dafydd’s works. In 2005, he premiered the complete ‘TimeQuake, Part VII/no.2,’ an eighty-minute ‘piano séance,’ at the Hamburg Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe. A live recording of that concert is available on Youtube.
In 2013, Nathan traveled to Pusan, Korea, to record the complete solo piano works of composer Quentin Kim. The album, ‘Sehnsucht,’ is available on all digital music sites as well as in hard copy on this website. Quentin’s body of work includes a masterful Piano Sonata, a set of Variations on an Ancient Korean Melody beloved by audiences everywhere, numerous miniatures, and a Prelude and Fugue, dedicated to Nathan. In December 2019, Nathan performed a showcase of Quentin’s music at New York’s Shetler Studio, joined by Quentin for a performance of Schubert’s Fantasy in f minor.
Also released on recording are the Chai Variations on Eliahu HaNavi, composed by Judith Shatin, William R. Kenan, Jr Professor at University of Virginia. The recording, ‘Poets of the Piano: Acts of Faith’ features a selection of pieces inspired by the search for transcendent spiritual experience, composed by Bach, Glass, Shatin and Scriabin. Shatin wrote, “I am delighted with pianist Nathan Carterette’s recording of my Chai Variations on Eliahu HaNavi. The effective dramatic arc he has chosen to shape the variation order is matched by his superb technique.”
Nathan has worked with many other composers on their works, including Dinos Constantinides, James MacMillan, Marcus Maroney, and others.
With Dafydd Llywelyn at a concert in Dortmund
“I am always deeply touched by Mr. Carterette’s interpretation and performances of my music, they are always beautifully imaginative and inspired. He possesses keen insights into the psychology of musical compositions, and his empathetic sensibility reveals multiple aspects of music.”