Clarinet virtuoso returns to Wisconsin for exclusive performance

Brian Viliunas, a clarinet virtuoso, conductor and Wisconsin native, will perform at Carroll University, the only performance during this visit to his home state. The concert will be at 7:30 p.m. on Monday, April 14, 2014, in the Dorothy Goff Frisch Recital Hall of Shattuck Music Center, 218 N. East Ave., Waukesha. This event is free and open to the public.

Performance selections will include “Fantasy Pieces Op. 73” by Robert Schumann, “Cantilène” by Louis Cahuzac, “Sonata for Clarinet and Piano” by Leonard Bernstein, “The Moon in My Window (2007)” by Eric P. Mandat and “BLACK DOG Rhapsody for Clarinet” by Scott McAllister.

Viliunas has performed in 11 states and Washington D.C., 14 countries, and on three continents. He has played with orchestras in Houston, Racine and Alabama, and the Bergen Philharmonic while he lived in Norway.

He has been a member of the Youth Orchestra of the Americas, for which he performed principal clarinet on the DVD recording of Verdi’s “Requiem” with conductor Placido Domingo. He also has performed with Lorin Maazel, Benjamin Zander, Carlos Miguel Prieto and Andrew Litton. 

A native of Greendale, Wis., Viliunas was a member of both the Milwaukee Youth Symphony Orchestra and the Wisconsin Wind Orchestra, the resident professional ensemble of Carroll University. He attended Northwestern University, Rice University and Arizona State University, earning degrees in clarinet performance at each. His teachers include Russell Dagon, Dan Roberdeau and Robert Spring.

Viliunas will be accompanied by Mary Anna Salo, who is the music director at Calvary Lutheran Church in Brookfield, Wis., is a private teacher and is a freelance accompanist. She studied piano at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee with Judit Jaimes before transferring to the studio of Elena Abend, with whom she completed her undergraduate studies in spring 2012. She also has trained at the Well Prepared Pianist Institute.

Salo has participated in the Mimir Chamber Music Festival at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Dakota Sky International Piano Festival, the international PianoArts competition and the Well Prepared Pianist Institute’s international festival. She also has been a featured artist in Steinway Piano Gallery of Milwaukee’s “Sandwich and a Steinway” program. In January 2014, she launched Winterpast Recital Series, which is dedicated to providing young artists in southeast Wisconsin performance and publicity opportunities.

For more information on the concert, contact Dr. Larry Harper, professor of music, at 262.524.7188 or lharper@carrollu.edu.