PREFORMANCES WITH ALLISON CHARNEY to Feature Joel Fan, Julia Zilberquit, and More at Kaufman Music Center Debut

Merkin Concert Hall at Kaufman Music Center's famed acoustics will be put to the test when "PREformances with Allison Charney" fills the celebrated New York City concert hall with the sound of music on October 16 at 1PM. A stellar cast marks the classical concert series' debut in the Lincoln Plaza neighborhood in "PREformances" of works ranging from Russian powerhouse composers to Schoenberg's haunting Holocaust tribute, to Fiddler on the Roof's familiar melodies, as well as several brand-new works by living composers, including Moshe Knoll and Peteris Vasks.

Now in its 9th year, the innovative classical concert series PREFORMANCES WITH Allison Charney invites audience to experience celebrated classical musicians in "PREformances" anticipating their upcoming engagements on the world's most prestigious stages. Acclaimed opera singer Allison Charney hosts a behind-the-scenes glimpse into top-level artists' practices and performance, deliberately blurring the traditional barriers which exist between classical musicians and audience in concerts. Ms. Charney promises a complete concert experience that provides entertainment and insight providing audiences with classical music knowledge that she promises "is simply not Googleable."

True to its mission PREFORMANCES' October 16th concert will offer audiences an intimate glimpse into concerts literally taking place worldwide by special guest's artists pianists Joel Fan and Julia Zilberquit, violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins, conductor Jason Tramm and actor Jordan Charney. From the stages of the New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC) to London's Tate Museum, from over 1M online YouTube visits to the Open Source Music Festival, PREFORMANCES WITH Allison Charney season opening concert is both a study in contrasts, whose reach is impressive

In anticipation of "Prayer for Peace: The Power of One Voice" classical music concert taking place October 27th at NJPAC Soprano Allison Charney and violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins will present Israeli composer Moshe Knoll's lush setting of Psalm 133. The widely acclaimed Kelly Hall- Tompkins has been praised by the New York Times as "the versatile violinist who makes the music come alive" and for her "tonal mastery" (BBC Music Magazine) and "searing intensity" (American Record Guide), violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins is forging a dynamic career as a soloist and chamber musician. Winner of a Naumburg International Violin Competition Honorarium Prize as well as a Concert Artists Guild Career Grant, Ms. Hall-Tompkins has appeared as soloist with orchestras including the Dallas Symphony, Oakland Symphony, Jacksonville Symphony, Tulsa Philharmonic, Chamber Orchestra of New York, and a Brevard Festival Orchestra under the baton of Keith Lockhart, in addition to numerous concerts and recitals in cities including New York, Washington, Cleveland, Toronto, Chicago, Baltimore, and Greenville, South Carolina, and at festivals in France, Germany and Italy.

Noted American conductor Jason Tramm (who conducts soprano Allison Charney and fellow guest violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins, together with Metropolitan Opera singers baritone Mark Delavan, tenor Adam Klein and mezzo soprano Karolina Pilou with the MidAtlantic Opera Orchestra and the Seton Hall University Chorus in the October 27th concert "Prayer for Peace: The Power of One Voice") - will "preform" Schoenberg's gripping cantata "A Survivor from Warsaw" composed for narrator, men's chorus and orchestra, will lead distinguished actor Jordan Charney as Schoenberg's narrator with 15 members of the Seton Hall University Chorus on October 16th.

Jordan Charney has been a forceful presence in the world of entertainment as a performer, writer, director and teacher for over half a century. His performing career began in the early days of live television and he was an acting member of the groundbreaking revolutionizing 60's theater group, The Open Theater. Primetime television audiences will recognize Mr. Charney from as far back as Mr. Angelino on the 1980's hit show, THREE'S COMPANY to his recent position on the bench as Judge Donald Karan on LAW AND ORDER. Feature film credits include GHOSTBUSTERS, NETWORK, FRANCES, THOSE LIPS THOSE EYES and LINDA, just to name a few. New York Theater audiences have seen Mr. Charney on and off-Broadway in starring roles in dozens of productions, including Harold Pinter's THE BIRTHDAY PARTY, Lanford Wilson's TALLEY'S FOLLY, William Nicholson's SHADOWLANDS (with Nigel Hawthorne and Jane Alexander), both TROILUS & CRESSIDA directed by Sir Peter Hall, and MEASURE FOR MEASURE for the New York Shakespeare Festival in Central Park and most recently in Willie Holtzman's SOMETHING YOU DID with Joanna Gleason at Primary Stages. From the Goodman Theater in Chicago to the Huntington in Boston, most regional theaters in the country have featured performances by Mr. Charney. He was named Best Male Actor in Baltimore for his tour de force performance of Donald Waldman in Willie Holtzman's HEARTS at Center Stage. Mr. Charney is especially proud to have created the role of the narrator in Kim D. Sherman's SONGBIRD AND THE EAGLE in his critically-acclaimed performances with the San Jose Chamber Orchestra. Mr. Charney starred in the premiere performance of his play A CHEKOV CONCERT at the Moscow Art Theater, where he was one of the first western performers ever to appear on that stage

Violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins will also "preform" a suite from Fiddler on the Roof arranged for her, which she will record with orchestra and release later this year.

"The Fiddler: Expanding Tradition" will feature a full album of newly commissioned and original Fiddler-inspired works. Accompanying Kelly Hall-Tompkins on PREformances will be Stephen Benson, guitar; Joshua Camp, accordion and Steve Moran, bass. For thirteen months on Broadway, Ms. Hall-Tompkins was the "Fiddler," violin soloist, for the Bartlett Sher production of "Fiddler on the Roof," with numerous solos written especially for her. The New York Times hailed her in a feature article as holding the title role, together with dancer Jesse Kovarsky. Featured as soloist in almost 500 Broadway performances, plus a Grammy-nominated cast album alongside a bonus track by Itzhak Perlman, Ms. Hall-Tompkins groundbreaking classical performance and role as "the Fiddler" took New York by a storm and has been the subject praise by NBC's Today Show with Harry Smith, NBC 4 New York with Janice Huff, NBC 4 at 5, Playbill.com, BroadwayWorld.com, WWFM radio Princeton and Strings Magazine.

No stranger to the world's greatest stages and a frequent featured guest of PREformances, Pianist Julia Zilberquit will play selections of the great Russian composers - Rachmaninoff, Scriabin and Tchaikovsky - in advance of her upcoming concerts in London and St. Petersburg. Russian-born American pianist Julia Zilberquit has earned critical acclaim as a recitalist, orchestral soloist, chamber musician, and recording artist. She was praised by The New York Times as "an outstanding soloist" after her Carnegie Hall performance of Cesar Franck's symphonic poem Les Djinns for piano and orchestra with Leon Botstein and the American Symphony Orchestra. Ms. Zilberquit also premiered her own arrangement of Shostakovich's Concertino for piano and orchestra at Carnegie Hall and recorded it with Vladimir Spivakov and the Moscow Virtuosi. In 2014 Warner Classics released her CD, Bach: Complete Solo Keyboard Concertos; Bach-Vivaldi, hailed as a "gorgeous rendition" by the prestigious Gramophone Magazine. In commemoration of the 60th Anniversary of the State of Israel, Ms. Zilberquit performed Slonimsky's, The Jewish Rhapsody for Piano and Orchestra, dedicated to her by the composer.

Ms. Zilberquit has been a guest soloist with numerous orchestras, including The Brooklyn Philharmonic, Russian State Orchestra, Vienna Chamber Orchestra, Deutsche Symphony, Moscow Soloists, Cairo Symphony, Moscow Virtuosi, Bolshoi Orchestra, Musica Viva, "I Musici de Montréal", The Russian Philharmonia, Moscow Chamber Orchestra, Sinfonietta Cracovia, and Sinfonia Varsovia.

In preparation for Open Source Music Festival, pianist Joel Fan will "preform" several new pieces by contemporary composers. An artist with a "probing intellect and a vivid imagination" (New York Times), Joel Fan is a uniquely brilliant pianist conjoining great works of the past and newly discovered music of cultures from around the world. As the Boston Globe commented, Joel is a "Champion of new music, explorer of world music." Consistently acclaimed for his recitals and appearances with orchestras, Mr. Fan scored two consecutive Billboard Top 10 Debuts with his solo CDs World Keys and West of the Sun. In collaboration with the renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma as a member of the Silk Road Ensemble, Joel Fan has appeared in numerous venues such as Carnegie Hall in New York, the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, and on the popular nationally-televised programs Good Morning America and Late Night with David Letterman. He also shared the stage with Mr. Ma for performances of the Beethoven Triple Concerto with the New York Philharmonic under the baton of David Zinman. Mr. Fan has appeared as soloist with numerous orchestras throughout the world, including the New York Philharmonic, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, London Sinfonietta, Singapore Symphony, New Symphony Orchestra of Bulgaria, and Odessa Philharmonic, among others. In addition to Maestro Zinman, his performances with conductors include Alan Gilbert, Zubin Mehta, David Alan Miller, Gustav Meier, and David Robertson. A native New Yorker, Mr. Fan studied at the Juilliard Pre-College Division as a student of Katherine Parker and Martin Canin. He received his Bachelor degree from Harvard University, where his teachers included the composer Leon Kirchner. He holds a Master of Music degree in Piano Performance from the Peabody Conservatory, where he studied with Leon Fleisher. He is also a prize winner of several international competitions, including the Busoni International Piano Competition in Italy. He was also the winner of the Kosciuzko Foundation's Chopin Prize and named a Presidential Scholar by the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts. Joel Fan is a Steinway Artist.

PREformances' founder and host, soprano Allison Charney's operatic career began in earnest following the national finals of the Metropolitan Opera Competition with her debut at the New York City Opera as Musetta in La Bohme. She went on to sing most of Puccini's leading soprano roles in opera companies throughout the country, including the title roles in Madama Butterfly, Tosca and Suor Angelica, Mimi in La Bohème and Liù in Turandot, earning a reputation for her "vocal agility, lush sound and dramatic portrayals" of the lirico-spinto roles in her wide-ranging repertoire. Ms. Charney has experienced enormous success with her Mozart interpretations as well, including both Susanna and the Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro, both Donna Anna and Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni, Pamina in Die Zauberflöte and Sandrina in the rarely heard La Finta Giardiniera. She wowed both audience and critics all over the United States with her tour-de-force portrayals of all three heroines in Offenbach's Tales of Hoffmann. Her versatility has also led her to sing roles as varied as Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus, Micaëla in Carmen, Nedda in Pagliacci, Santuzza in Cavalleria Rusticana and the title roles in Martha, La Traviata, Jenufa and The Merry Widow.

Ms. Charney's career has brought her to opera companies across the United States, including the New York City Opera, Atlanta Opera, Florida Grand Opera, Utah Opera, Nashville Opera, Opera Memphis, Annapolis Opera, Opera Theater of Connecticut, New Rochelle Opera, Opera Illinois, OperaDelaware, Utah Festival Opera, DiCapo OperaTheater, Tampa Opera, Opera Idaho, Syracuse Opera, Washington Summer Opera Festival, Colorado Opera Festival and Mississippi Opera. Concert highlights have included performances at Alice Tully Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, as a featured soloist with the esteemed Philadelphia Orchestra and with the Boston Pops under the baton of Alan Gilbert.

Continuing her commitment to performing music of our times, Ms. Charney recently premiered Moshe Knoll's Psalm 133 with the San Jose Chamber Orchestra, in a concert that also featured Kim D. Sherman's oratorio (composed for Ms. Charney) Songbird and the Eagle. Upcoming performances will include further premieres of pieces by Michael Ching, Ms. Sherman and Mr. Knoll, whose Psalm 133 she will sing in concert under the baton of noted conductor Jason Tramm in "Prayer for Peace: The Power of One Voice" at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center where she will also be the soprano soloist in Beethoven's Ninth Symphony on October 27, 2017.