Grammy-Nominated Virtuoso David Lanz Returns to Firehouse Arts Center

Grammy nominated pianist David Lanz has enthralled music lovers around the world for decades with his engaging playing style and original compositions. He is a contemporary instrumental legend, whose deeply-felt compositions helped forge the New Age music movement. With a unique impressionistic style emulated by countless pianists, his compositions and arrangements are studied and performed by students everywhere. The Firehouse Arts Center presents David Lanz in concert for one performance only on Saturday, September 14, at 8:00 p.m.

Journalists have tried to define his style, calling it classical crossover, contemporary instrumental, and adult alternative.  But Lanz has his own favorite tongue-in-cheek catchphrase that suits his sound perfectly: “heavy mellow.”  His music defines heart, soul, guts, splendor, musicality, humanity, meaning, depth and all the other things that really matter.  Through his music Lanz connects intimately with his audiences like an old friend, which is what he has become to so many around the globe.

David Lanz was only five when he first touched a keyboard, inspired by his mother and grandmother, both pianists. By his teens, Lanz had begun working with local rock combos in the Pacific Northwest (his first was called the Towne Cryers), then a regional hotbed for R&B-flavored garage-rock and, later on, the new artsy, progressive-rock sound.

A full decade passed, during which Lanz took gigs playing rock, funk and even disco, anything to pay the bills and get his name out there. Then came, in his words, the epiphany: “I had been doing yoga and meditating and getting into Eastern philosophy, and slowly I started thinking about how music could help. By the early ’80s I was really into the idea that this kind of music would be an interesting path to take…I’d always had this secret melodic, easy side,” Lanz says. “And I put that together with the desire to help people—if they want, they can use the music for relaxation or de-stressing, or for introspection.  So all those different influences started to roll together.”

What set Lanz apart from other artists recording in a similar vein at the time was his penchant for not ignoring melody and rhythm. Where some in the so-called New Age scene (a term that Lanz accepts but doesn’t love: “It’s a lifestyle,” he says, “not a musical genre.”) sought only to soothe, often by presenting a theme and then repeating it ad infinitum, Lanz’s work is dynamic, alive, with musical movement and form. “If you listen to my stuff, even if there are no drums, my left hand is my rhythm section,” he explains.

Lanz’s big commercial breakthrough arrived in 1988 with Cristofori’s Dream. The album consists of six Lanz originals, including the opening title track which has become a classic, and a cover of Procol Harum’s 1967 rock hit A Whiter Shade of Pale. Cristofori’s Dream became an enormous success, topping Billboard magazine’s first Adult Alternative/New Age chart and remaining for a remarkable 27 weeks. The title track remains hugely popular today, and countless piano students have purchased the sheet music to learn how to play the piece.

The Firehouse Arts Center hosts David Lanz in one performance only…an evening of transcendent music with the Maestro!

Tickets are $18-$27, with youth, senior, and group discounts available.  Tickets can be purchased online at www.firehousearts.org, by calling 925-931-4848, and in person at the Firehouse Arts Center Box Office, 4444 Railroad Avenue, Pleasanton.  Box Office hours are Wednesday - Friday 12:00 noon-6:00pm and Saturdays 10:00am-4:00pm, and 2 hours prior to performances.