Fuller’s hitting all the right notes
While keeping one eye on the tractor rumbling through her parent’s farmyard, aspiring concert pianist Maria Fuller spoke confidently about her scholarship to a prestigious music school in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Fuller, 23, spent this past winter on the family grain farm located near Earl Grey, 65 kilometres northwest of Regina, preparing for a pressure-packed audition for the master’s degree program in piano performance at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music.
It all came down to a 14-minute session in February. The result? She was accepted on a 90-per-cent scholarship and counts herself as being “very lucky,” Fuller said.
In the time since, she has racked up top honours at musical competitions in this province. Fuller was the Grand Award winner of the Regina Music Festival, and then at the Provincial Finals held in Saskatoon. In that city, she also won the Florence Bowes piano competition.
Her next competitive endeavour is in July, in Halifax at a national festival for music teachers. And as a warmup, she’s performing an hour-long program tonight at Regina’s Knox Metropolitan Church, beginning at 7 p.m. Admission is by donation.
“Everything I’m playing in this recital, I’ll be playing at that competition. So the recital is supposed to be a run-through for that,” Fuller said in a recent telephone interview.
The program, which is part of the Cecilian Concert Series, includes classics by Bach, Mozart, Chopin, Scriabin, Liszt — and a piece by Regina composer David McIntyre.
Yet another competition will follow in August, and then Fuller will shift herself and her attentions to Cincinnati and the two-year masters program. Hopefully it will all lead to what most students are aiming for — a job in her discipline.
“My goal is to become a professional concert pianist and to engage in performances that involve solo, chamber and collaborative efforts — and also to dabble in composition and church ministry.”
Fuller is also known in musical circles for her trumpet skills. By 2005, she had held the provincial title for playing a brass instrument for three consecutive years. And when she entered McGill University to undertake a bachelor’s degree, she was accepted on both trumpet and piano. She later narrowed her focus to piano.
But she still plays with a family group called the Fuller Brass, and is looking forward to an upcoming gig at the local credit union. Fuller Brass has been playing for years and currently includes Maria and siblings Natalie, Alice, Abby and Nolan, who range in age from 14 to 27.
“We just kind of grew up playing in the church community and retirement centres, gigging with hits from the 1940s and ‘50s,” Maria said.
“By age 12, my dad had ingrained about 40 hits in my head from the ‘40s and ‘50s and my love for music was fostered in the communication that I could have with people who were hearing songs they hadn’t heard forever ... and making that kind of a personal connection.”
As further evidence that musical talent runs in the family, Maria’s eldest sister Natalie is completing her doctorate at the top-rated Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y.
Fuller said her mom Corinne had some piano schooling and her dad Gordon sang a bit, but they don’t play very much now. When pushed to assign credit for her talent and love for music, she thanked God.
“I’m just trusting that in the end my career and my future are in God’s hands, and I just worry about this one day that I have, and it’s preparing for this recital.”