Ouachita Stories

Ouachita Baptist University will host Dr. James Cockman III, winner of the National Federation of Music Club’s (NFMC) 2009 Young Artist Competition in piano, in concert Tuesday, Sept. 15, at 7:30 p.m. The performance will be held in Mabee Fine Arts Center’s McBeth Recital Hall on Ouachita’s campus. It is open to the public and free of charge.

“This is a special year for us because it’s the 50^th year that we have hosted Young Artists at Ouachita,” said Dr. George Keck, chair of Ouachita’s division of music and organizer of the Young Artist tour in Arkansas. “We’re proud to carry on the tradition as well as bring in new talent to perform every year.”

Cockman, a nationally recognized pianist, will be performing selections from compositions by W.A. Mozart, Felix Mendelssohn, Franz Liszt, Modest Mussorgsky and Claude Debussy.

“We are particularly excited to have an artist coming with the caliber of Dr. Cockman because he is an outstanding performer,” Keck said. “He is very young—he’s at the beginning of his career—and he has a very promising career at that. So we’re excited to be a part of that.”

Not only is Cockman an accomplished performance pianist, but he also served as a faculty lecturer at the University of Kansas and has taught piano literature seminars. He currently teaches private lessons in the Kansas City metropolitan area and serves as pianist and organist at his church.

Cockman earned his Doctorate in Piano Performance and Pedagogy from the University of Kansas, his master’s degree in piano performance from Central Missouri State University and his bachelor’s degree from William Jewell College. He has won many awards and competitions in piano, including the Naftzger Young Artist competition, the King Award Competition, the GMA 32nd Annual Music in the Rockies Competition and the Lee Biennial Competition. For more information about Cockman, visit www.jamescockman.com.

As the 2009 winner of the Young Artist competition, Cockman’s concerts are being arranged nationwide by the NFMC. In Arkansas, he will be performing in Little Rock, Monticello, Bentonville, Texarkana and Arkadelphia. For more information about the NFMC, visit www.nfmc-music.org.

By Hannah Clayton