Please join pianist Franz Mantini and violinist Amy Schwartz Moretti for the third annual Strings in the Spring.
About Franz Mantini, piano
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Franz Josef Mantini, pianist and graduate of the University of South Florida, took an unusual route to the concert stage. Although he had piano lessons since his youth, it was not until he auditioned for then USF distinguished artist-in residence Jacques Abram that he became serious about the music. Inspired by the teaching of Abram and the beauty of the piano literature, Mantini renewed his studies with enthusiasm, performing frequently and winning the school’s Concerto Competition before graduating in 1987.
Mantini has since maintained an active schedule of both solo and chamber music. He has performed Concertos by Beethoven, Rachmaninoff, and MacDowell and chamber music with the Lafayette String Quartet and principal members of The Florida Orchestra, the San Diego Symphony, and the Houston Symphony. He was a prize winner in the 1990 Florida West Coast Chopin Competition and won a Jury Discretionary Prize and Best Performance of a Classical Era Work at the 4th and 5th International Piano Competitions for Outstanding Amateurs, respectively, presented by the Van Cliburn Foundation.
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Mantini earned his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering and master’s degree in engineering management and has applied his training working at a variety of electronics companies in the Tampa Bay area. Mr. Mantini resides in Tampa with his wife Julie, and sons Gabriel and Gianni.
About Amy Schwartz Moretti, violin
Invited to Carnegie Hall for her solo concerto debut in 1998, Ms. Moretti is recognized for her musical elegance and grace. She has made extensive solo and collaborative appearances in addition to orchestral performances as former Concertmaster of the Oregon Symphony and The Florida Orchestra. She recently performed the concerti of Brahms and Beethoven with the Corvallis Symphony, Mozart’s Violin Concerto No.5 at the Brevard Music Center with Keith Lockhart conducting, and debut concerts with the Omaha Symphony and music director Thomas Wilkins. Commenting on the Mozart performance, the Classical Voice of North Carolina highlighted Ms. Moretti’s cadenzas: “smoking passagework, languorous, intimately inflected and exquisitely shaped tones, an infallible sense of timing – some of the most exquisite playing I’ve heard this season.” Ms. Moretti is currently the Director of the Robert McDuffie Center for Strings at Mercer University.