"His music gets closer to my heart," explains pianist Helena Aung of Chopin's music, whose work is what she played at her first recital when she was six. "When I was younger I felt like the only way to express myself was through music," she explains. In playing piano she found a refuge.
A recent graduate of the piano performance program in the music school at the UA, Aung studied under Jura Margulis, and is now auditioning for master's programs in piano performance. She stops by the Firmin-Garner Performance studio to play from Beethoven and elaborate on her love of piano prior to a number of recitals she's put together in Northwest Arkansas.
She is also a performer in Margulis's NWA Community Classical Piano Concert Series, an effort to showcase works from the likes of Bach, Liszt, Chopin and Beethoven performed by students and recent graduates of the music department's piano performance program, a series that continues Dec. 3-7. For more information on those concerts email margulis@uark.edu or visit the Of Note with Katy Henriksen Facebook page.