NOTE: “Today” and “tonight” refer to Friday, April 29.
SEQUIM — Imagine the intricate music Beethoven could have created on a piano had he been born with eight legs and eight arms.
Now imagine no longer.
Not one, two or three, but four pianists will grace the Olympic Theatre Arts stage during two performances this weekend
The four pianists — tickling a combined 352 keys during the performances — are known as Paul Creech & Good Company.
The concerts are at 7:30 tonight and Saturday night at Olympic Theatre Arts, 414 N. Sequim Ave.
Tickets are $15 and may be purchased online at www.olympictheatrearts.org.
For more information, call 360-683-7326.
During the concerts, the group will perform original music composed by Creech, a Sequim musician and piano teacher.
“I do have three concertos I am doing — advanced concertos,” he said.
“All three have been written for piano and orchestra but you will only hear four pianos at this event.”
On stage with Creech will be three of his gifted students, Trent LaCour, 19, Tyler Messenger, 14, and Gracye Houle, 11. All four have been practicing for several hours daily throughout the past three months in preparation for this concert, Creech said.
Emcee and conductor for Paul Creech & Good Company is Dewey Ehling, best known as the conductor and director of the Peninsula Singers.
“You are going to like what you hear,” Creech said.
“I work really hard with these kids. I’ve got four big grands lined up side by side and I work with them a lot. They have all gotten very gifted by playing and exercising the technique and playing grace notes. They will be playing way above what people are used to hearing.”
While style and technique are an essential piece of the music education Creech offers, he said he also encourages his pupils to explore the emotional aspect of the music they perform.
“First of all, we learn to memorize the material — I call it finger memory,” Creech said.
After that, Creech said he wants to “make it entertaining. Let’s make it beautiful. We really focused on enjoying our practices as much as possible. I believe this is reflected in our performances.”
Creech said he has a “profound need for people to learn over and above traditional teaching. I teach composition and theory along with it because I want them to know what this music is really about.”
Creech said he instructs his students “to play above the printed page because a lot of people — man, they are stuck to that note and they are afraid to listen. They are afraid to express. We get past that.”
He even encourages improvisation among his students, “up to a point,” he said.
“They cannot change the harmony.”
Meet the students
LaCour’s passion for piano began as a home-schooled student when he was 11 years old, Creech said.
Within a year of beginning piano lessons, his technical virtuosity and interpretive abilities became evident, Creech said.
LaCour has studied with Creech since 2010 and the two have performed together in a variety of musical venues, including a piano duo concert with the Port Townsend Symphony last year.
Messenger began playing piano when he was 7 years old, Creech said.
Creech discovered Messenger in 2015, and they continue working together on composition theory and technique, Creech said, adding Messenger memorized six pieces for this concert.
The youngest of the group, Houle, began taking lessons and reading music at age 5.
After moving to Sequim, she began instruction from Creech and has improved tremendously throughout the past three years, Creech said.
These are Houle’s first performances in front of an audience, during which she will play six pieces.
Six decades teaching
Born and raised on a farm in Missouri, Creech, of Sequim, was introduced to the piano at age 9.
He studied related theory and composition at Kansas State University and performed his own concertos with the Salina Symphony in Kansas.
As he continued to perform for live audiences, Creech about 60 years ago began offering music classes to private students and opened a successful piano tuning business.
Creech said that when he works with great artists, he feels as if he has hit his zenith.
“This has been the case time after time during the course of my life and there seems to be no place to stop that I’m aware,” he said.
Creech is particularly in awe of his three current protégés, describing them as “over the top,” when it comes to musical talent on the piano.
During his career, Creech said he became acquainted with virtuosos Van Cliburn, Victor Borge and duo Melvin Stecher and Norman Horowitz.
As Creech’s musical career progressed, composing and arranging became a passion, he said.
“For me, composing is a natural extension of my training and devotion to music,” he said.
“Writing music for solo and two pianos, or for full orchestra is a genuine treat because the music seems to flow effortlessly, inspiring the performers as well as the audience.”
This weekend’s concerts will fuse original orchestral arrangements with a diversity of music styles, Creech said. Many of the pieces were composed rapidly, from the soul, he added.
Creech encourages the public to attend the performances, adding they were “written especially for you.”
