MONROE — Monroe Arts Center opens the 2018-19 entertainment season at 2 p.m. Sept. 23 in MAC’s Gunderson Stiles Concert Hall, 1315 11th Street, Monroe, with a concert by the piano duo, Stanislava Varshavski and Diana Shapiro. This is the first of eight performances to be presented as part of the Sunday Concert Series. 

The Varshavski-Shapiro Piano Duo began playing together in 1998. Since then, they have gone on to capture the top prizes at numerous competitions.

The Varshavski-Shapiro Piano Duo has performed in venues such as the HKAPA Concert Hall in Hong Kong, Henry Crown Symphony Hall in Jerusalem, Teatro Valle in Rome and Lincoln Theater in Miami. They have appeared with the Radio Orchestra in Munich, the Israel Chamber Orchestra, the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra and Miami’s New World Symphony. 

Outside of their current home base in Wisconsin and Illinois, the duo has recently given concerts in Georgia, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Vermont and Texas, where they performed Poulenc’s Concerto for Two Pianos with the Wichita Falls Symphony Orchestra.

This duo’s concert titled “One Piano — Four Hands” at Monroe Arts Center will feature four pieces by composers Carl Czerny, Valery Gavrilin, Franz Schubert, and a special arrangement of George Gershwin’s “An American in Paris.” 

Audience members are invited to attend a reception following the concert.

Monroe Arts Center members may attend this concert for free. 

Tickets may be purchased by calling the Monroe Arts Center at 608-325-5700 or 888-596-1249, or in person at the box office located at 1315 11th Street, or online at www.monroeartscenter.