Album Notes

Pianist Paul Tuntland Sánchez (1982) was born in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and started his piano studies at age four. From 1998-2005, Paul studied with Dr. Tamás Ungár, Executive Director of the TCU/Cliburn Piano Institute and one of the world's foremost pedagogues, at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas, where he became the first freshman in the history of the university to win the School of Music's Piano Concerto Competition. He received full academic scholarship and the prestigious Presser Scholar award in recognition of his outstanding musicianship and academic excellence, and graduated in 2005 summa cum laude. Paul has performed in solo recital throughout the US, and also in Mexico, Canada, Germany and Spain. His performances with orchestra have included concerts with the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra, the TCU Symphony Orchestra, the Cherokee Symphony, and the Fort Worth Civic Orchestra, performing such varied works as Grieg's Piano Concerto in A minor, Op. 16, Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, Beethoven's Choral Fantasy, Op. 80, Rodrigo's Concierto Heroico, and Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 30. Sanchez is also an advocate of musical education for children, and recently performed with pianist Shields Collins Bray in a Musical Awakenings series of educational recitals sponsored and produced by the Van Cliburn Foundation in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. He received a Fulbright Scholarship in 2005 and is now pursuing his Master of Spanish Music degree with Ms. Maria Teresa Monteys and Ms. Alicia de Larrocha at the Academia Granados-Marshall in Barcelona, Spain.