Join the Skidmore College Music Department and Saratoga Performing Arts Center for this exclusive performance.
Pianist Lara Downes has been called “an explorer whose imagination is fired by bringing notice to the underrepresented and forgotten” (The Log Journal). An iconoclast and trailblazer, her dynamic work as a sought-after performer, a Billboard Chart-topping recording artist, a producer, curator, activist, and arts advocate positions her as a cultural visionary on the national arts scene. Ms. Downes’ musical roadmap seeks inspiration from the legacies of history, family, and collective memory, excavating the broad landscape of American music to create a series of acclaimed performance and recording projects that serve as gathering spaces for her listeners to find common ground and shared experience.
This event is part of the Filene Anniversary Concert Series, celebrating the 100th anniversary of Helen Filene Ladd’s graduation from Skidmore, the 40th anniversary of Skidmore’s Filene Music Program, and the (belated) 10th anniversary of the inauguration of the Helen Filene Ladd Concert Hall. Skidmore is excited to welcome these artists to the Helene Filene Ladd Concert Hall as a way to honor the continuing contributions and the proud Skidmore legacy of the Filene Ladd family. We thank the Lincoln and Therese Filene Foundation for their support of this series.
Downes will lead a piano masterclass for music majors at Skidmore the night prior to her performance. She will also return on August 4 with The Philadelphia Orchestra, for her SPAC debut where she’ll perform two premieres: The Strayhorn Concerto and Price’s Piano Concerto in One Movement.
Tickets for the April 14 performance are $30 for general admission and $10 for all Skidmore students, faculty, and staff with valid school ID. Skidmore students enrolled in the music program will have free admission. Skidmore College strongly encourages guests to be fully vaccinated and masked when attending a performance in the Arthur Zankel Music Center.