ABOUT CHARLES
Charles Whitehead is a New Zealand concert-pianist, jazz musician and music educator of Maori, English and Samoan heritage, residing in the USA.
As a solo pianist, Charles has performed in many countries with a diverse performing repertoire ranging from Orlando Gibbons to Charles Wuorinen. His special interest is the groundbreaking music of the early 20th Century including Ravel’s Gaspard de la nuit, Stravinsky’s Petrouchka Suite, Scriabin Sonatas and the music of the Second Viennese School. While resident in Fort Worth, Charles was actively involved in TCU’s New Music Ensemble, playing solo piano music by Bernard Rands and Ludmila Yurina in US premiere performances.
In November 2017, Charles performed his New York debut recital at Weill Hall at Carnegie Hall and at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival the following year. In 2019, he performed solo concerts in Florence, Italy and in London at St. Martin-in-the-Fields on Trafalgar Square where he represented New Zealand in the Pianists of the World Concert Series; as competition winner, he performed Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No.3 with the Texas Tech Symphony Orchestra under Maestro Philip Mann. In 2024, solo recitals are scheduled at the Mozarthaus in Vienna and at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
In the areas of piano pedagogy and performance literature, Charles’ creative research is inspired by Heinrich Neuhaus’ intriguing comments on Stanislavski in Neuhaus’ classic text, “The Art of Piano Playing”. His interdisciplinary research adapts aspects of Konstantin Stanislavski’s acting ‘System’ - specifically, the ideas of artistic ‘truth’, justification, creative ‘experiencing’ in performance, and through-line of actions - to the preparation and performance of solo instrumental works. Charles has presented his research at conferences in the US (TMTA) and Canada (University of Calgary) on topics related to this ongoing research.
In the Spring of 2019, his dissertation was nominated by faculty for an Outstanding Dissertation Award in the humanities and fine arts category at Texas Tech University. His work has been cited by performance and academic researchers in and outside of the US.
Charles’ teaching for the College of Visual and Performing Arts, the School of Music and his work as an adjudicator for the Texas Tech Annual Jazz Festival are highlights of his doctoral work. He served as an adjudicator for the Rocky Mountain Music Competition in Toronto in the advanced levels of solo piano, concerto, jazz and vocal categories and at the TTU MTNA Festival. In addition to classical piano, he has taught composition, chamber music, music history, theory and jazz.
His professional work as a pianist extends to symphonic and chamber music, opera, sacred music, musical theatre, jazz and Latin music. He has worked for the Fort Worth Opera and has extensive experience in art song collaboration and literature. Charles is a founding member of the Caprock Piano Trio and assists the Lubbock Chorale in preparing for orchestral performances. In May 2021 at the newly opened Buddy Holly Hall in Lubbock, Texas, he performed as pianist and arranger for David Gaschen’s guest artist performance with the Lubbock Symphony Orchestra. He has also played for Broadway stars, Betty Buckley, Kristen Chenoweth, Capathia Jenkins and worked with Classical mezzo-soprano, Susan Graham. His most recent appearances as pianist and synthesizer performer with the Lubbock Symphony were in September and October 2024.
Charles Whitehead has composed jazz works for violin, sacred compositions and two original musicals with libretto by Emmy award-winning writer Dr. Richard Allen, both of which premiered in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex.
Charles studied under Texas Tech University’s Artist-in-Residence and Horn Professor, Dr. William Westney. He is the final PhD Fine Arts performance major to graduate at this institution. Prior to this, he studied with Van Cliburn Competition Gold Medalist, Jose Feghali in the Master of Music and Artist Diploma programs at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas and with Rumanian concert pianist, Tamas Vesmas at the University of Auckland.