Featuring Maine’s best-known pianist and visiting performers of international renown, the piano rules ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College’s Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St., for nine days in October.

One of the world’s foremost violin, cello and piano ensembles, the Vienna Piano Trio performs music by Beethoven, Erich Korngold and Brahms at 8 p.m. Friday, Oct. 5.

ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½’ Noonday Concerts series presents artist-in-residence Frank Glazer and his former student Chiharu Naruse, now a performer and teacher in her own right, playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto in D minor on two pianos at 12:30 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 9.

In a particularly “ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½y” event, pianist Duncan Cumming, another Glazer student and a member of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ class of 1993, premieres two preludes by ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ faculty member William Matthews at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 10.

Finally, acclaimed pianist Inon Barnatan — described as “refined, searching, unfailingly communicative” by London’s Evening Standard — opens the at 8 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 13. Barnatan also holds a master class in the concert hall at 11 a.m. the following day.

Admission for the Barnatan concert is $10 for the general public and $3 for students. The other events, including the Barnatan master class on Oct. 14, are open to the public at no charge. For Barnatan concert reservations or more information, please contact 207-786-6135 or this olinarts@bates.edu.

More about the performers:

(Oct. 5) Since 1988, the Vienna Piano Trio has visited virtually every major music center in Europe, the Americas, Australia and the Far East. Violinist Wolfgang Redik, cellist Marcus Trefny and pianist Stefan Mendl studied with such towering musical figures as Isaac Stern and Joseph Kalichstein as well as members of the Beaux Arts Trio and the Guarneri and LaSalle string quartets.

In 2001, Matthias Gredler replaced Trefny. Today the trio performs regularly at such festivals as the Schubertiade Schwarzenberg, the Mozartwoche Salzburg and the Beethovenfest Bonn, as well as events in Canada. They have appeared in London, Paris, New York, Buenos Aires, Toronto, Mexico City, Tokyo, Sydney, Barcelona and Berlin.

(Oct. 9) Ninety-two-year-old Frank Glazer, a pianist of international renown, has taught at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ since 1980. In a era whose pianists often strive for the gloss of mechanical precision and a big sound, Glazer instead makes all else secondary to the music’s own message.

“He has thought everything through and tried to get at the core of what the music is about. Everything he does is about that,” says colleague James Parakilas, a pianist himself and the James L. Moody Jr. Family Professor of Performing Arts at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½.

A Topsham resident, Glazer brings to the concert stage a highly distinguished career that includes numerous recordings, solo recitals and performances with orchestras and chamber ensembles, including the New England Piano Quartette, of which he was a founder.

In October 2006, Glazer celebrated the 70th anniversary of his 1936 New York City debut by performing that debut program at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½.

A faculty member at the Portland Conservatory of Music, Chiharu Naruse began studying piano at age 4 and studied in Japan until 1996. In 1997, she was accepted to the Hans Eisler Hochschule fuer Musik in Berlin, where she performed recitals regularly. In 2002, she moved to the United States to study with Glazer. She has given several concerts at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ and has played with the Portland String Quartet and the Augusta Symphony.

(Oct. 10) Duncan Cumming will premiere the preludes “Two Chords” and “Prestissimo” by Matthews. “They are part of a set of eight pieces composed two years ago, exploring different styles of music and ways of making pianists work extra hard,” the composer explains.

‘Prestissimo,’ for example, usually indicates that the music should be played about as fast as possible. Yet in this quick little piece, the performer finds the word ‘stringendo’ at a certain point, which means to speed up still more.”

Cumming will also perform music by Debussy, Chopin and Weber. A native of Maine, he graduated with highest honors from ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College in 1993, where he studied with Glazer.

In 1994, on a full scholarship from the European Mozart Foundation, he participated in chamber music study and performance at the European Mozart Academy in Prague, Czech Republic. He received his master’s in 1996 from the New England Conservatory, and in 2003 earned his doctorate from Boston University.

Cumming was on the faculty at Phillips Academy in Andover, Mass., from 1994-2006. In 2002, he joined the faculty of the Boston University Tanglewood Institute, where he is assistant director of the Young Artists Piano Program. He joined the faculty of the University at Albany in fall 2006.

Cumming frequently collaborates in double concerto, two-piano and four-hand repertoire with Glazer, and performs with his wife Hilary, violinist and head of applied music at Concord Academy in Concord, Mass.

Alice Swanson Esty Professor of Music at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, Matthews is a composer and conductor who studied at Oberlin, the University of Iowa, Yale and the Institute of Sonology in the Netherlands. A recipient of several national awards and commissions, he is particularly interested in electronic and computer-generated music, and in American music of all types. He teaches composition along with courses in jazz and popular music.

(Oct. 13–14) In the opening performance of the 2007–08 ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Concert Series, Barnatan will play sonatas by Haydn, Barber and Schubert. A Dallas Morning News reviewer wrote of Barnatan, “This young Israeli, only 27, has had some great teachers and won some important prizes — who hasn’t these days? But he really might be on the level of [iconic pianists] Artur Schnabel or Leon Fleisher.”

Despite his youth, Barnatan has built a flourishing reputation through orchestral, recital and chamber performances worldwide. He is praised for his poetic and passionate playing and his thoughtful programming. Recent seasons have brought him to Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, Vienna’s Musikverein and the Arts Theatre in Shanghai.

His debut CD, a Schubert collection for Bridge Records, was released in June 2006 to great critical applause. Also in 2006, Barnatan devised a project of compositions from Schubert’s last year of life that he will present this season with the Amsterdam Concertgebouw and guest artists.

Born in Tel Aviv in 1979, Barnatan started piano at age 4 and made his orchestral debut at 11. He resides in New York City.

Musicians performing at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College in September include Frank Glazer, a prominent Maine pianist and ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ artist in residence; Atsuko Hirai, a soprano and member of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ faculty; and the Verdehr Trio, internationally acclaimed for its development of the violin-clarinet-piano trio repertoire.

Glazer opens the college’s 2004-05 Noonday Concert Series at 12:30 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 14, with music by Bach, Busoni, Haydn and Mendelssohn. ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Noonday Concerts typically last around 30 minutes.

The Verdehr Trio, which has commissioned some 170 pieces of music during a career of more than 30 years, performs at 3 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 19. The trio’s pianist, Yuri Funahashi, lives in Maine, and the program includes a piece by ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ faculty member Philip Carlsen. Also on the program is the world premiere of “Playground,” a composition by Barry Conyngham, chair of Australian studies at Harvard University.

Hirai, the Kazushige Hirasawa Professor of History at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, is accompanied by Glazer in a program of 10 songs by Johannes Brahms. This Noonday Concert takes place at 12:30 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 21.

Finally, Glazer offers music by Mozart, Schubert and Schumann in a recital at 8 p.m. Friday, Sept. 24.

The Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St., is the site of all four concerts, which are open to the public at no cost. For more information, please call 207-786-6135.

Through commissioning new works and transcribing or rediscovering music from centuries past, the Verdehr Trio has molded and defined the personality of the violin-clarinet-piano trio. The ensemble has performed worldwide in chamber concerts and in trio-concerto repertoire for orchestra. Its catalog of recordings includes the 17-volume series “The Making of a Medium,” documenting the trio’s contributions to the repertoire (Crystal Records). An article about the trio appears in the new Groves Dictionary of Music.

Though in residence at Michigan State University in East Lansing, where violinist Walter Verdehr and clarinetist Elsa Ludewig-Verdehr teach, pianist Yuri Funahashi lives in Wilton and teaches at the University of Maine in Farmington. She is known statewide for her performances with such chamber ensembles as the Nordica Trio and the Funahashi-Pane Duo.

A highlight of the trio’s ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ program is the world premiere of Conyngham’s “Playground.” In addition, the trio performs its own arrangement of the Andante-Allegretto (Op. 43, No. 13) from Beethoven’s music for the ballet “The Creatures of Prometheus”; Carlsen’s 1987 “Penumbra”; Peter Sculthorpe’s 1992 “Dreamtracks,” inspired by the Australian landscape; William Brohn’s adaptation of music by songs by George and Ira Gershwin; and “Tibetan Dance,” composed and dedicated to the Verdehr Trio by Bright Sheng.

One of Maine’s best-known pianists, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College artist-in-residence Frank Glazer is a musician of international stature. His long career includes numerous recordings, and countless solo recitals and performances with orchestras and chamber ensembles, including the New England Piano Quartette, of which he was a founder.

Glazer, 89, taught at the Eastman School of Music for 15 years before retiring to Maine with his wife, Ruth, in 1980. The couple founded the Saco River Festival, held in Cornish every summer. A student of pianist Artur Schnabel in the 1930s and ’40s, Glazer is one of the few remaining proteges of that great musician.

The first Kazushige Hirasawa Professor of History at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ and a specialist in Japanese history, Atsuko Hirai is a graduate of Tokyo University and earned her Ph.D. in government at Harvard. She and Glazer perform together occasionally at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½.

Philip Carlsen has degrees from the University of Washington, Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center. His many compositions include works for such Maine ensembles as the Portland Symphony Orchestra and ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½’ gamelan orchestra, and a commission from the National Symphony Orchestra and the Kennedy Center in connection with the orchestra’s residency in Maine. Carlsen teaches half-time at UMF and half-time at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, where he conducts the college orchestra.

ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Noonday Concerts are open to the public at no charge.

Derek’s Trick Bag is led by Derek Thibault, a 12-year-old lead guitarist, and drummer Tynan Nida, 13, both students at Lisbon’s Philip W. Sugg Middle School. The band plays jazzy, technically advanced rock, including songs by guitar superstars Joe Satriani and Steve Vai, as well as rock icons Frank Zappa and Van Halen.

“The abilities of both boys were obvious from the first time I heard each of them play,” says Edward Judd, who teaches music at Sugg and works with the pair in the school’s jazz and concert bands. “Their ability to pick things up quickly was impressive, and they have a sense of style and musicality that I only tend to see in older students.”

Rounding out the band are the boys’ fathers, rhythm guitarist Gerry Thibault and bassist Don Nida.

“It’s high-energy, that’s for sure. The boys really fly,” says the elder Thibault, who is a plumber in the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Facility Services department and also plays with a classic-rock combo, the Easy Living Band.

For more information, call 207-786-6135.

• Tuesday, March 27: Rose Pruiksma, clarinetist; Amy Beal, pianist; and Adam Brandow, violist, perform music by Mozart and Poulenc.
• Thursday, March 29: Barbara Moore, trumpeter, and Mark Howard, pianist, perform music by Corelli, Hindemith and others.
• Tuesday, April 3: David Kirby, pianist, performs a solo recital of works by Schubert and Chopin.
• Thursday, April 5: Piano students of Natasha Chances.
• Tuesday, April 10: Elizabeth Florian and Lauren Holmes, clarinetists.
• Thursday, April 12: Justin Lloyd, trumpeter, and Mark Howard, pianist, perform music by J.S. Bach, Mozart and contemporary composers.

November 9: Cancelled.
November 14: Soprano Christina Astrachan and pianist Frank Glazer, artist- in-residence at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, will perform songs of Robert Schumann.
November 16: Pianist Colin Britt performs Beethoven and original compositions.
November 20-27: No concerts scheduled due to Thanksgiving recess.
November 28: Nissa Gainty, oboe, performs music by Saint-Saens and others.

Additional information about the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Noonday Concert Series is available by calling the Olin Arts Center at 207-786-6135.

The ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Chamber Singers will perform Thursday, March 2. Soprano Christina Astrachan and company will perform a baroque program, including work by Bach on Tuesday, March 7. Oboist Nissa Gainty, a ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ sophomore from Concord, N.H., and pianist Mark Howard, coordinator of the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, will perform works by J.S. Bach and Hindemith on Tuesday, March 14.

Students in “Great Composers,” taught by Amy Beal, assistant professor of music at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, will perform on Tuesday, March 21. Anthony Shostak will perform with one of his banjo students on Tuesday, March 28. ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ sophomore Chris Hoover of Lake Bluff, Ill., and first-year student Luc de La Granville of Geneva, Switzerland, will give a clarinet concert on Thursday, March 30.

Additional information about the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Noonday Concert Series is available by calling the Olin Arts Center at 207-786-6135.

James Parakilas, fortepiano, will performs works from the classical period Feb. 1. Vocalists Carmen Nadeau and Paul Jalbert will present a program of popular songs and show tunes Feb 8. ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ senior Sarah Teillon, alto, assisted by John Corrie, piano, will present Sea Pictures, a song cycle by British composer Edward Elgar, Feb. 15. There will be no concert Feb. 22 when the college is in winter recess. Joshua Fix, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ class of 1999, will present a program of original compositions Feb. 29.

Additional information about the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Noonday Concert Series is available by calling the Olin Arts Center at 207-786-6l35.

The young American cellist has won unanimous praise for playing that combines natural virtuosity with impassioned musicianship. The New York Times called her “an enormously talented musician” whose performance of a Dvorak cello concerto featured “boldness, assured technique and vibrant tone.”

Born in 1982, she began playing the cello at age four and a half. She performed her first public concert six months later. A student of Richard Weiss, she is a member of the Young Artist Program at the Cleveland Institute of Music. Weilerstein made her Cleveland Orchestra debut in October 1995 at age 13, playing the Tchaikovsky Rococo Variations. She first appeared at Carnegie Hall with the New York Youth Symphony in March 1997 and also has given concerts with the Albany Symphony, the California Symphony, the Puerto Rico Symphony and the Rochester Philharmonic.

During the 1997-98 season, Weilerstein returned to the Rochester Philharmonic and made debuts with the Barcelona Symphony Orchestra under Lawrence Foster’s direction and the Long Island Philharmonic. During the last two summers, she participated in the Verbier Festival in Switzerland and also made her recording debut in London with a recital album for EMI Classics.

Weilerstein also has performed at the Cleveland Museum of Art, as part of the young artists recital series of the La Jolla Chamber Music Society in San Diego and the Ravinia Festival. During her first tour to Japan in 1999, she gave a Suntory Hall recital in Tokyo in 1999.

Weilerstein plays regularly throughout the country with her parents, Donald and Vivian, as the Weilerstein Trio. She first performed with them at age 6 at the Round Top Festival in Texas. Since then, the trio has performed in Akron, Cleveland, Chicago and Toronto, as well as the Eastman School of Music and the Aspen Music Festival. They recorded their debut CD, The Ives Piano Trio, in 1998.

Alisa Weilerstein has played for many musicians including Yo-Yo Ma, David Finckel, Paul Katz, Lynn Harrell and Dorothy DeLay. She was profiled in 1998 by CBS This Morning as part of its nationally televised series on the “Class of 2000.”

The next concert in the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Concert Series will be Shanghai String Quartet and Eliot Fisk, guitar, who will perform at 8 p.m., Monday, Feb. 7, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall. Tickets for this concert are also $10 for general admission and $8 for students and seniors and may be purchased by calling 207-786-6252.

Sept. 21: Soprano Atsuko Hirai, Kazushige Hirasawa Professor of History at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, and pianist Frank Glazer, artist in residence at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, will perform an all-Gounod program, including “The King of Thule” and “The Jewel Song” from Faust and “Juliet’s Waltz Song” from Romeo and Juliet.

Sept. 28: Guitarist John Smedley, associate professor of physics at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, will perform a jazz program with Mike Hansen, conga drums.

Additional information about the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Noonday Concert Series is available by calling the Olin Arts Center at 207-786-6135.

April 1: Alicia Weisser, a ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ first-year student from South Windsor, Conn., will perform a program of music for cello.

April 6: Soprano Christina Astrachan and pianist Frank Glazer, artist- in-residence at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, will perform songs of Richard Strauss and Hugo Wolf.

April 8: ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ cello instructor Kathleen Foster and students from the Merriconeag School in Brunswick will perform.

April 20: No concert is scheduled as the college is in recess.

April 27: Mike Richard, a ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ junior from Hooksett, N.H., will perform a program of music for guitar.

Additional information about the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Noonday Concert Series is available by calling the Olin Arts Center at 207-786-6135.