Anna Billias, vocalist and piano accompanist for Sweet Briar College’s music program, will perform at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 15 in Memorial Chapel. Admission is free.
The concert is dedicated to Billias’ father, who passed away last December, and was originally intended as a gift for his 61st birthday. He lived in Ukraine, where Billias grew up, and his birthday is on Oct. 16 – or Oct. 15 in the United States.
Anna Billias (right) and her daughter, YelenaBillias, 27, will perform piano pieces by Cesar Frank, Sergey Rachmaninov, Cyril Scott and Frederic Chopin, among others. She also will sing songs by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Alexander Dargomyzhsky and other Russian composers.
She will share the stage with her 8-year-old daughter, Yelena, who also will sing and play piano. All of the songs will be sung in Russian.
The program includes “very popular, old-style Russian songs,” Billias said, adding that she hopes the emotions of the songs will transcend the language barrier. “The music is such an international thing that you truly do not need to know the language.”
Billias moved to the United States with her daughter in 2006, and has been working at Sweet Briar as an accompanist and adjunct piano instructor since 2007. She started playing piano when she was 6 years old; Yelena has been playing since age 3.
She also is an accomplished artist. Her oil paintings are on display in local galleries, and some of her recent work will be exhibited at the concert.
For more information, contact Rebecca McCord, professor of music, at
mccord@sbc.edu or (434) 381-6115.
— By
Suzanne Ramsey,
SBC staff writer
