DESCRIPTION:
McCracken was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis as a college student and doctors said she would never be able to play the piano again.  But she did, maneuvering performances around exacerbations.  During the summer preceding this concert while on a strenuous international duo tour as Artistic Ambassadors of the United States with her husband, violinist Cyrus Forough, she was hospitalized for over a month.  That December, still privately battling MS, she performed a duo recital with her husband at the Kennedy Center and less than a month later, this acclaimed solo recital.  The following day she was hospitalized once again.  Her last solo appearance was in Chicago on the Vladimir Horowitz Steinway.  After several years absence from the piano, she is now working toward making recordings.  McCracken is a Steinway Artist.
 
Carolyn McCracken Orchestra Hall debut, Allied Arts Piano Series
January 18, 1988, Chicago; recorded live on cassette by audience member
 
-PROGRAM-

Domenico Scarlatti
Sonata, C major, L. 104
Sonata, F minor, L. 187
Sonata, A major, L. 345
 
Ludwig van Beethoven
Fifteen Variations and a Fugue on an Original Theme, E-flat major, Op. 35, "Eroica Variations"
 
Frédéric Chopin
"Andante spianato et grande polonaise," Op. 22

Intermission 

Franz Liszt
"Vallée d'Obermann" from "Années de pèlerinage"
Nocturne, "En rêve"
"Nuages gris"
First Mephisto Waltz from Lenau's "Faust"
 
Encores
 
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
Flight of the Bumblebee

Frédéric Chopin
Minute Waltz