VERO BEACH — In the waterfront Stuart home of Lindsay Garritson earlier this month, card tables overflowed with CDs and programs. Garritson and her mother, Marie Jureit-Beamist, had given an in-home concert attended by more than 100 connoisseurs the night before.
Next week, many more will have a chance to hear Garritson, this time in Vero Beach, when the Yale-educated pianist, the second-place finisher in the 2011 Montreal International Piano Competition, will debut with the Atlantic Classical Orchestra.
ACO is a professional resident orchestra staging concerts in both Vero and in Stuart.
It frequently hires guest performers; rarely do they have local connections.
Stewart Robertson, ACO’s music director holds Garritson in high regard.
“The Saint-Saens concerto she is playing is a substantial piece,” he said. “It is a big virtuoso vehicle. Lindsay is young and it is sort of amazing for her to have such a track record of big competition wins at such an early age.”
The motivation for those wins is reflected in the family home, with music-making leaving its mark at every turn.
A flute lies across the bench of an ornately gilded organ across the room from a gleaming baby grand piano. The walls display portraits of various family members on piano, violin and cello.
From the ceiling through strategically placed speakers, strains of the Saint- Saens piano concerto drift through the rooms.
Garritson, 24, who in addition to the prestigious win in Montreal took first prize the year before in the Chopin International Piano Competition, has played piano since she was 5 years old.
She began studying violin three years earlier.
“She is the strongest woman I have ever met,” says Garritson of her mom, who has a doctorate in music and is a professor at Principia College in Illinois.
Garritson herself holds a master’s in piano performance and an artist’s diploma from Yale. She says her mother remains a powerful influence in her life.
“Growing up, kids don’t want to practice. But she was very persistent – not just with music but with school. The reason I have been able to keep going is this foundation of discipline.”
In turn, Juriet-Beamish, a commanding presence, may be her daughter’s greatest fan.
“Lindsay as an artist has exquisite taste and a fiery dynamic quality and depth of understanding that comes through the music,” she said. “When she played the Brahms’ ‘Piano Concerto No 1. in D Minor’ at Yale, the level of inspiration she conveyed moved the audience to tears. They were waiting for the last chord to jump up and express their joy. There was a tenderness and dazzling brilliance.”
Garritson, who grew up in St. Louis the youngest in a family of four musically gifted children, has performed with no less than eight orchestras, including the St. Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra, the Yale Philharmonic, and France’s European Philharmonic Orchestra.
She has played for American dignitaries such as Jimmy Carter and Colin Powell, and brought back numerous prizes from piano competitions throughout the world.
“They say comparisons are odious, but Lindsay’s style of playing reminds me of (Van Cliburn Gold Medal-winner) Jon Nakamatsu,” said Robertson. “Her playing is very clean and muscular – very tidy and incredibly secure. She is very focused and stylish. This is not mushy playing. I love that.”
There is nothing mushy about Garritson.
With elegance and grace, she seems to inhabit her music.
“It’s basically my life,” she said. “I do music because I want to share something beautiful with whoever is listening. Seeing people’s reaction after I play is really rewarding.”
Both Garritson and Jureit-Beamish are proponents (and products) of the Suzuki method, an approach similar to the way children learn their native language.
“The important thing is it is not about the person or ego of who is performing, but what can I give,” says Juriet-Beamish of the Suzuki philosophy. “It’s not about a personal career.”
While Garritson believes in giving “beauty and vitality” through her work, she is also very serious about her career.
“I try to stick to practicing four to six hours a day,” she said. “It’s what you have to do to get it done. This profession is so competitive you have to keep learning and keep up the repertoire.”
The plight of the pianist is unique to other players of other instruments. Orchestras generally employ a single piano player, so it is much more difficult for the aspiring pianist to find an audience.
“You can either solo with an orchestra or do a solo recital or a concert series,” Garritson explained.
In between the many international piano competitions, Garritson works as staff accompanist for the Yale School of Music.
“This is the first time I will play with the Atlantic Classical Orchestra and I am extremely excited,” she said. “My mother is on the board and my sister Ashley (Garritson) plays cello with them.”
But these familial connections had nothing to do with Robertson featuring Garritson as soloist.
“I had been hearing about Lindsay from a number of sources for some time,” said Robertson. “We got together and she played several things and I thought, wow, this girl is really something. She is having quite a career and winning big prizes. She won first place in the Mozart competition in Salzburg; many, many years ago I was the second prize winner. I thought, whoa, this is a trip down memory lane. She is doing fabulously well. She was the obvious choice.”
Garritson has been playing the Saint- Saens concerto since she was 10 years old.
“There are three movements,” she explained. “The first is the most dramatic. Saint-Saens wrote a lot for organ and you can hear that influence. But there are also moments that are incredibly beautiful and sweet.”
Whether she is practicing or performing, Garritson says she goes into the zone – the high-frequency, beta-wave brain state associated with artistic focus.
“For me music is all about communicating some sort of message, touching someone in the audience emotionally,” she said. “When you perform you have a piece of music somebody wrote and the goal is to bring justice to the piece. But you can’t do that by just playing the notes. You have to bring something of yourself to the music.”
Both Jureit-Beamish and Robertson feel that Garriston’s performance with the ACO is significant not only because of her rare talent but also the fact that she hails from Stuart.
“We often look outward for greatness,” said Jureit-Beamish, “and need to cherish what is here.”
“It is very fortuitous,” added Robertson. “Some feel when an orchestra features a local pianist it is an indulgence. That is not true in this case. Lindsay is clearly a lady on the way up the ladder as a national soloist who happens to be part of a family who lives locally.”
Garritson will perform with the ACO Thursday Jan. 5 at the Waxlax Center for the Performing Arts at St. Edward’s School beginning with the 7:10 p.m. “Conversation with Maestro Stewart Robertson” followed by the 8 p.m. performance. The program includes Mozart’s “Symphony No. 28 in C Major,” Saint-Saens’ “Piano Concerto No. 2 in G Minor” and Mendelssohn’s “Symphony No. 4 in A Major: Italian.”
For more information, call (772) 460- 0850 or visit the ACO website www.acomusic.org.