Jacksonville, AL – JSU’s Brett Buckner shared that a pair of JSU music professors are continuing to establish them on the international stage. The Dr. Rachel Park, assistant professor of piano, as well as Dr. Eliezer Yanson, Jr. director of activities for choral were recently named as finalists in the category of The American Prize in separate categories.
Dr. Park is one of the finalist to win The American Prize in the professional category of solo piano performances as Dr. Yanson is an award winner in three categories: the college/university division that includes conducting, choral singing in the JSU Chamber Singers and choral performance with the JSU A Capella Choir.
The American Prize National Nonprofit Competition is the largest competitions in the arts of performing. The contest was launched in 2010 and the competition was designed to honor the top directors, performing artists and ensembles, as well as composers from the United States at the professional and college, university and high school levels. It is based upon submitted performances.
The Dr. Park joined the JSU faculty in 2018 as an assistant Professor of Piano. Through her professional career she has performed in more than a thousand recitals and concerts with different ensembles, soloists and orchestras across the US and abroad. That includes achieving her lifelong goal of performing in the renowned Carnegie Hall in New York City in March.
The Dr. Yanson arrived at JSU in the year 2019 as an assistant professor in music as well as the director of the choral program. He is the conductor of JSU’s A Cappella Choir, Chamber Singers and the Civic Chorale. The group has appeared in Carnegie Hall three times, particularly in March when he was the Conductor for JSU’s A Cappella Choir. The year 2015 was the time he won as the winner of third place of The American Prize in conducting in the chorus division for universities and colleges.
